Apply for Max Planck PhD Positions. ✅ Competitive TVöD salaries & premium facilities. ❌ Strict entry standards. Start your career in Germany!
The Max Planck Society is Germany’s most successful research organization. With over 80 specialized institutes, it provides a unique “excellence-driven” environment where the world’s leading scientists are given the freedom to pursue high-risk, high-reward research without the burden of heavy teaching loads.
Why Pursue Research at Max Planck?
- First-Class Funding: PhD candidates are typically employed under the TVöD (Public Service Wage Agreement), usually at 65% or 75% of the E13 level, ensuring a comfortable living standard in Germany.
- International Environment: More than half of all researchers at Max Planck Institutes come from outside Germany, creating a truly global and English-speaking academic culture.
- The “Harnack” Principle: Max Planck chooses the best “brains” and builds the research around them, rather than following pre-set rigid departmental structures.
Below, you will find the latest research vacancies across the various Max Planck Institutes, including roles in Biology and Medicine, Chemistry, Physics, and the Human Sciences.
Max Planck PhD Positions
PhD Position (f/m/d) | Short-Term Mindsets and Crime: An Experimental ApproachApril 16, 2026Max Planck Institute for the Study of Crime, Security and Law, Freiburg
PhD Student (m/f/d) | Genetics of BehaviourApril 16, 2026Max Planck Institute for Neurobiology of Behavior – caesar, Bonn
PhD Student (f/m/d) | NMR structure of AP-L complex of hIAPP and its effect on fibrils and membranesApril 15, 2026Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences, Göttingen
PhD Student (f/m/d) | Structural characterisation of α-Synuclein-lipid complexesApril 15, 2026Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences, Göttingen
Doctoral position (f/m/d) | Microplastics in the environment: from laboratory analysis to source attribution modelingApril 14, 2026Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology, Jena
5 Master FellowshipsApril 13, 2026Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing, Cologne
3 PhD positions (m/f/d) | Sustainable Metallurgy (Experiment & Simulation)April 09, 2026Max Planck Institute for Sustainable Materials GmbH, Düsseldorf
PhD position in field-based human ecology and behaviorApril 09, 2026Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
Doctoral Researcher (m/f/d)April 08, 2026Max Planck Institute for Political and Social Science, Göttingen
Radiocarbon Laboratory Engineer (m/f/d)April 08, 2026Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena
Doctoral Student (m/f/d) | The History of European Union Employment LawApril 08, 2026Max Planck Institute for Legal History and Legal Theory, Frankfurt am Main
PhD position in ancient pathogen genomicsApril 07, 2026Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
Doctoral Researchers (m/f/d)March 23, 2026Max Planck Institute for Political and Social Science, Göttingen
PhD Position (f/m/d) | Computer VisionMarch 06, 2026Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems, Tübingen, Tübingen
16 PhD Positions | Imaging Cellular Processes and DiseaseMarch 02, 2026Max Planck Institute for Molecular Biomedicine, Münster
PhD position in field-based human and/or ape locomotor biomechanicsFebruary 18, 2026Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Leipzig
PhD Student or Postdoc (f/m/d) | Theory and Algorithms for Structure Determination from Single Molecule X-Ray Scattering ImagesFebruary 04, 2026Max Planck Institute for Multidisciplinary Sciences, Göttingen