DSU grants in Italy: a guide for international students and their families

For many international students, a regional DSU grant is what makes an Italian degree affordable. In the regions this guide covers, a grant can waive the university fees, pay several thousand euros a year and bring a cheaper room and canteen meals with it. It is also easy to lose: a deadline missed in August, an income document without the right stamp, or too few exam credits by the end of the first year. This guide explains how the system works, using the 2026/27 calls, so that families planning for 2027/28 know what to prepare and when.

What DSU is

DSU stands for Diritto allo Studio Universitario, the right to university study. A national law, Legislative Decree 68 of 2012, sets the minimum standards and the money involved; the grants themselves are run region by region, each through its own agency. Students from outside the EU can apply on the same terms.

So there is no single Italian grant to apply for. There is the EDISU call in Piedmont, the ER.GO call in Emilia-Romagna, the DiSCo call in Lazio and so on, each with its own amounts, documents and deadlines. In Lombardy each university runs its own call. The body that matters to you is the one where your university is.

What a grant covers

• University fees: by law, students eligible for the grant are fully exempt.
• Money: a yearly amount, partly paid in cash and partly in services.
• Meals: free or reduced-price meals in university canteens, depending on the region.
• Housing: a room in a university residence for students from out of town, if you ask for one and a place is free. Its value is taken off the cash.

For 2026/27 the ministry set the minimum yearly amount for a student from out of town at €7,171.11. Each region applies its own scale by income band, so two students with the same family income can receive different amounts in different cities:

Who qualifies

Eligibility rests on family income and assets, measured with Italy's ISEE indicator. For 2026/27 the national ceilings were an ISEE of €28,339.88 and an ISPE (the assets indicator) of €61,608.48. Regions may set lower ceilings, and some do: EDISU Piemonte used €26,306.25 and ER.GO €25,000.

In the first year applicants are ranked on income alone. Grades come in later, as a minimum number of exam credits you must earn to keep the grant and to renew it.

Proving your family's income from abroad

This is the step to start first, because it is where an application most easily goes wrong. A family whose income and property are outside Italy cannot get a normal ISEE. It needs an ISEE parificato instead, calculated from documents about the family's income and assets in the home country, usually by a tax-assistance office (CAF) approved by the regional body or the university.

• What the documents show: who is in the household, each member's income for the reference year, and the family's property and savings. At least one call asks for the floor area of each property in square metres.
• Who issues them: authorities in your home country. They are then legalised or apostilled and translated in the way the call asks. Most calls still say legalised by the Italian embassy or consulate. Allow weeks, not days.
• Pakistan: embassy legalisation is no longer available. Since 18 November 2024 the Italian embassy in Islamabad accepts only documents apostilled by Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Some 2026/27 calls state that an apostille is accepted for Hague Convention countries (DSU Toscana, EDiSU Pavia, ERDIS Marche); others mention legalisation only. Where the call is silent, get the body's answer in writing before relying on the apostille.
• Self-certification: some bodies accept none. DiSCo Lazio says so explicitly.
• The rules differ more than you would expect. For 2026/27 the University of Milan asked for foreign income documents only from students of a listed group of mostly high-income countries; students from other countries were placed in the lowest income band, with possible checks later.

Students from countries on the ministry's list of "particularly poor countries" can use a simpler certificate in place of full income documents. The 2026/27 list has 46 countries, including Bangladesh and Nepal. Pakistan is not on it, for 2026/27 or 2025/26, so Pakistani students go through the full process. The list is renewed each year by ministerial decree; the 2026/27 decree was signed on 24 February 2026.

When to apply

Calls are published in early summer and, in 2026, deadlines ran from late July to the end of September. That is often before you have your visa or have even enrolled: the DSU application runs on its own timetable, separate from the university application. The earliest closed in July (Politecnico di Milano on 21 July for students already enrolled, DiSCo Lazio on 22 July); the southern bodies closed in August (Catania on 10 August, Messina on 18 August, Cagliari on 28 August); Padua and the University of Milan closed last, on 30 September.

Because foreign income documents take weeks to issue, apostille and translate, the date that really matters is the day you start collecting them, which should be in spring.

A plan for 2027/28 entry

This plan follows the pattern of the 2026/27 cycle, and the calls for your region decide the actual dates.

• Now to spring 2027: collect the family's income, property and household documents for the reference year, then apostille or legalise and translate them as your region's last call asked.
• February to March 2027: the ministry's decrees on amounts, income ceilings and the list of particularly poor countries are expected, as in 2026.
• June to July 2027: the regional calls appear. Read the one for your city, not a neighbour's.
• July to September 2027: application deadlines, then the ISEE parificato at an approved CAF where the call requires it.

Keeping it after the first year

First-year grants are paid in instalments, and the second half depends on passing exams. Using the 2026/27 calls:

• EDISU Piemonte: the first half is paid automatically. The second half comes once you have at least 20 credits: reach them by 31 May 2027 and it is paid from late June; reach them by 10 August 2027 and it is paid from late November. If the credits arrive after 10 August but by 30 November 2027, you keep the first half and lose the second. If you do not reach them at all, the grant is revoked and the first half must be repaid.
• Politecnico di Milano: 35 credits for engineering and architecture, 40 for design, by 10 August 2027. Missing the target by 30 November 2027 revokes the grant in full: you repay the money, plus the value of the meals and housing you used.
• DiSCo Lazio: first-year credits must be earned by 10 August 2027.

A student who sits the first-year exam sessions can reach these targets. They catch out students who did not know the grant depended on them, so put the credit date in your calendar on the day you enrol.

Questions families ask

Rules change every year: always confirm dates in the official call for your year.