Context. EX Lupi is the prototype of EX Lup-type stars, which are classical T Tauri stars (cTTSs) with luminosity bursts and outbursts of 1–5 magnitudes that last for a few months to a few years. These events are ascribed to an episodic accretion that can occur repeatedly, but whose physical mechanism is still debated.

Aims. We aim to investigate the magnetically driven accretion of EX Lup in quiescence. We include for the first time a study of the small- and large-scale magnetic field. This allows us to characterise the magnetospheric accretion process of the system completely.

Methods. We used spectropolarimetric times series acquired in 2016 and 2019 with the Echelle SpectroPolarimetric Device for the Observation of Stars and in 2019 with the SpectroPolarimètre InfraRouge at the Canada-France-Hawaii telescope during a quiescence phase of EX Lup. We were thus able to perform a variability analysis of the radial velocity, the emission lines, and the surface-averaged longitudinal magnetic field in different epochs and wavelength domains. We also provide a small-scale magnetic field analysis using Zeeman intensification of photospheric lines and a large-scale magnetic topology reconstruction using Zeeman-Doppler imaging.

Results. Our study reveals that typical magnetospheric accretion is ongoing on EX Lup. A main accretion funnel flow connects the inner disc to the star in a stable fashion and produces an accretion shock on the stellar surface close to the pole of the magnetic dipole component. We also measure one of the strongest fields ever observed on cTTSs. This strong field indicates that the disc is truncated by the magnetic field close to but beyond the corotation radius, where the angular velocity of the disc equals the angular velocity of the star. This configuration is suitable for a magnetically induced disc instability that yields episodic accretion onto the star.