Why a website alone rarely gets funding

Anyone having a website built in Austria often hears: “There is funding for that.” True — with a restriction worth knowing beforehand. We went through the programmes of the federal states as of early October 2026. The picture is clear.

What gets funded is the process, not the business card

Lower Austria explicitly excludes websites and web shops on their own from its new “digi4Wirtschaft” funding; what is funded is whatever brings data into daily operations — automation, interfaces, analysis. Upper Austria's DIGITAL.PLUS 26 funds process automation, data and AI, and IT security, but no digital marketing and no standard software. Vienna's digitalisation funding requires a digitalisation plan and does not accept a single measure. The exception is Styria: the “Lebens!Nah” programme literally names the first-time creation of a website or online shop — 30 %, up to € 2,500.

• Viennastate programme open
• Lower Austriaopen, with restrictions
• Upper Austriaopen, with restrictions
• Styriastate programme open
• Carinthiaopen, with restrictions
• Vorarlbergopen, with restrictions
• Salzburgnone at present
• Tyrolnone at present
• Burgenlandnone at present

What that means in practice

A website with online booking that writes into your calendar is a process. A Buddy that takes enquiries, asks follow-up questions and enters appointments is automation. A website with opening hours and photos is a business card — good and necessary, but not eligible in most programmes. If you want funding, plan the project from the work it takes off your hands, not from the page it shows.

The order decides

All programmes share one rule: the application must be filed before the project starts — before anything is ordered, signed or paid for. Whoever commissions first and asks later gets nothing. That is why we start a funded project only once the application is out.

Where there is nothing at present

The federal programme KMU.DIGITAL is exhausted for 2026 and, according to the funding body, ends after 2026. At the time of this review Salzburg, Tyrol and Burgenland had no open state programme for small digitalisation projects. We say exactly that in the funding check — instead of building an application that has nowhere to land.

What we do

The funding check is free and without obligation: business, location, project — within two business days we tell you which programme fits, or that none fits at present. If we accompany the application, you pay for that only on approval, with a success fee agreed in advance. The funding body always decides, never we. Funding by federal state →