Portugal's prémio salarial pays back up to 1,500 euros in tuition, but the 2026 applications are still shut
The scheme refunds 697 euros to graduates and 1,500 to master's holders, every year, up to the year they turn 35. The catch: the 2025 and 2026 application windows never opened and the government hasn't explained why.
Apply / Learn moreIf you finished a degree or a master’s and you work in Portugal, the state owes you money. The prémio salarial refunds the equivalent of your tuition — 697 euros for a bachelor’s, 1,500 for a master’s — every year, up to the year you turn 35. The problem is that nobody can actually apply.
The 2025 and 2026 windows remain closed, even though the rules say the form should be available by May each year. The deadline listed on the government portal still points to June 2024, the service isn’t running, and there is no public explanation for the delay.
What is the prémio salarial exactly?
It was created in 2023 to keep qualified young people in the Portuguese labour market. The logic is simple: if you completed higher education and you work here, you can claim back the value of your tuition fees, year after year, consecutively or with gaps, until the year you turn 35. It isn’t a scholarship, it isn’t a loan, and it isn’t means-tested — it’s a refund for the qualification.
Who qualifies, and can you stack it with IRS Jovem?
This is where it shifted. Under the current rules, anyone benefiting from the IRS Jovem tax regime loses the prémio salarial — it’s one or the other. In July, though, the Socialists passed a bill with Chega guaranteeing the payment and making it stackable with IRS Jovem, which would completely change the maths for anyone in their first working years. The same group wants the form opened, exceptionally, until 30 September 2026.
What can you do in the meantime?
Keep the paperwork: your course completion certificate, the tuition amounts you actually paid, and your tax returns for the years involved. When the form opens — and the political pressure suggests it will — backdated claims will hinge on exactly those documents. The official page, with the legal framework, sits on the Portal das Finanças.
If you’re at the start of the path rather than the end, it’s worth also looking at the DGES student grants for 2026/2027, which have deadlines that actually work.
A support scheme that exists in law, has budget allocated and has no working form is a curious kind of public policy. But it’s still worth 697 or 1,500 euros a year — worth being ready for the day the button appears.
Image: Eugenio Hansen, OFS / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
