Applications are now open for the Mercor Research Fellowship – APEX, a highly competitive opportunity for researchers, economists, data scientists, AI practitioners, and graduate students interested in shaping the future of artificial intelligence evaluation and economic research. The fellowship offers funding of up to $80,000, access to frontier AI models, dedicated compute resources, expert mentorship, and the opportunity to contribute directly to industry-leading AI benchmarking initiatives.
Hosted by Mercor, one of the world’s fastest-growing AI data companies, the fellowship supports individuals who want to design innovative benchmarks, evaluation methodologies, or economic studies that improve understanding of AI capabilities and their impact on the global economy.
Applications are accepted on a rolling basis, with the current deadline set for 26 September 2026.
About Mercor
Mercor is an AI data company focused on organizing human expertise to power the AI economy. The company works with millions of domain experts worldwide who contribute to training and evaluating frontier AI systems.
Through its APEX benchmark family, Mercor evaluates whether AI models can perform economically valuable work across disciplines such as law, accounting, finance, software engineering, consulting, and scientific research. These benchmarks are developed using real-world workflows and validated by industry experts, providing a more accurate assessment of AI capabilities than traditional academic tests.
Mercor also conducts economic research to understand how AI is transforming labor markets, firms, and professional work. Leveraging proprietary datasets, enterprise partnerships, and large-scale expert networks, the company explores the economic implications of AI adoption across industries.
About the Fellowship
The Mercor Research Fellowship is designed for individuals who want to build the next generation of AI benchmarks, evaluation methodologies, and economic studies.
Unlike traditional research programmes, the fellowship is built around the applicant’s own research proposal. Participants are expected to submit a specific idea for a benchmark, evaluation framework, or empirical economic study that addresses an important gap in current research.
Selected fellows will receive funding, technical resources, mentorship, and access to unique datasets to develop, test, and publish their work.
The programme supports both remote participation and optional in-person engagement through Mercor’s San Francisco office.
Fellowship Benefits
Successful fellows will receive substantial financial and research support, including:
- $40,000 stipend for a 3-month fellowship
- $80,000 stipend for a 6-month fellowship
- Unlimited API credits
- Dedicated GPU compute resources
- Budget for expert reviewers and human-data collection
- Weekly one-on-one mentorship with members of the APEX research team
- Access to Mercor’s evaluation infrastructure
- Access to frontier AI model APIs
- Opportunities to work on real enterprise evaluation challenges
- Connections with researchers across academia and leading AI laboratories
- Potential consideration for a full-time position with the Mercor APEX research team
Research Areas
Mercor welcomes proposals across a broad range of AI evaluation and economic research topics.
Priority areas include:
- Long-horizon AI agent evaluations in law, finance, and consulting
- Advanced software engineering benchmarks
- Accounting and financial workflow evaluations
- AI applications in scientific research, mathematics, biology, materials science, and physics
- Economic benchmarking of negotiation, management, and decision-making capabilities
- Evaluation methodology research, including contamination resistance and human-versus-model assessment techniques
- Economics of human-data marketplaces and AI labor platforms
- AI-native organizational design and the future of firms
- Novel benchmark designs and innovative evaluation frameworks
Applicants with strong ideas outside these themes are also encouraged to apply.
Eligibility Requirements
The fellowship is open to candidates from diverse academic and professional backgrounds.
Ideal applicants should have:
- A strong interest in AI evaluation and measurement research
- Backgrounds in economics, computer science, machine learning, statistics, social sciences, human-computer interaction, psychometrics, or related disciplines
- A clearly defined benchmark, evaluation method, or economic research proposal
- The ability to work independently in a fast-paced environment
- Availability to commit at least 30 hours per week
- Capacity to participate for three to six months
Additional experience in AI evaluation, reinforcement learning environments, software engineering, finance, law, medicine, or scientific research is considered an advantage.
What Fellows Will Do
Fellows will work closely with Mercor’s APEX research team to develop and validate new approaches for measuring AI performance and economic impact.
Activities may include:
- Designing benchmark tasks and evaluation frameworks
- Developing grading systems and scoring methodologies
- Working with subject-matter experts to validate benchmark quality
- Conducting empirical economic research using proprietary datasets
- Running experiments with frontier AI models
- Publishing findings through papers, datasets, leaderboards, or research reports
- Contributing insights that influence industry-wide AI evaluation standards
The fellowship provides an opportunity to work directly on challenges facing frontier AI systems while contributing to research that may shape how the industry measures intelligence, reliability, and economic value.
Fellowship Details
Organization: Mercor
Programme: Mercor Research Fellowship – APEX
Location: Remote or San Francisco, London, and New York City
Duration: 3–6 months
Commitment: Minimum 30 hours per week
Funding: $40,000 (3 months) or $80,000 (6 months)
Application Deadline: 26 September 2026
Fields: AI Evaluation, Machine Learning, Economics, Data Science, Research
For researchers interested in advancing AI evaluation, benchmarking, and economic analysis, the Mercor Research Fellowship offers a rare opportunity to access significant funding, frontier technologies, industry mentorship, and influential research networks while developing innovative solutions for understanding the future impact of artificial intelligence.
