Applicants admitted to the MPhil and PhD as full-time candidates are automatically offered a Postgraduate Scholarship (PGS), which is sufficient to cover both tuition and living expenses. The PGS requires the student to work 100 hours per year for the department, usually as a Teaching Assistant. The Department is also able to nominate outstanding PhD candidates for the Hong Kong PhD Fellowship and the HKU Presidential PhD Scholarship at the time of admission. These provide more generous funding than the baseline PGS. More information on current fees, expenses, and funding is available here.

Once enrolled, postgraduate students are eligible to apply for conference/travel support from the University Research Committee (URC). The Department also provides some additional travel funding to help postgraduate students conduct research overseas.