COW – Immigration Levels Plan – June 9, 2025

Key Facts and Figures

• The 2025–2027 Immigration Levels Plan sets permanent resident (PR) targets, and for the first time this past year, included temporary resident (TR) targets. The 2025–2027 Levels Plan reduced overall immigration targets to support the economy while easing pressure on services and housing.

  Temporary and permanent resident targets

  	2025	2026	2027
  Temporary Resident Targets	673,650	516,600	543,600
  Permanent Resident Targets	395,000	380,000	365,000

  • TR targets were developed to achieve the objective of reducing the proportion of non-permanent residents (NPR) to 5% of the total population by the end of 2026. Targets capture new arrivals only, which provides the number of new workers and students entering Canada each year.
  • Supporting the Canadian economy continues to be a key priority of this Levels Plan. The economic category represents the largest proportion of PR admissions each year, reaching approximately 59% in 2025, 61% in 2026 and 62% by 2027.

Key Achievements (2024)

• Canada welcomed over 483,000 new PRs in 2024.
• Over 58% of overall PR admissions were coming from economic programs.
• More than 30,500 (7.2%) French-speaking immigrants settled in Francophone communities outside Quebec, exceeding the established target of 6%.
• Canada resettled more than 49,000 refugees in 2024, and
  • Recently met a number of humanitarian commitments, including:
    • Welcoming vulnerable Afghans; and
    • Meeting the government’s 2022–2023 Multi-Year Resettlement Commitments by resettling government-assisted refugees from the Middle East and Africa.
• Canada continues to make progress on a number of existing humanitarian commitments, including:
  • Welcoming individuals from the Americas via TR and PR pathways;
  • Permanent resident pathways for Ukrainians with family members in Canada, and certain Hong Kong residents; and
  • Various other commitments, including working towards resettling vulnerable Rohingya, human rights defenders, and LGBTQI+ people.

Key Messages

• Immigration continues to be a vital source of Canada’s economic sustainability. It now contributes to nearly 100% of labour force growth, including for occupations that face persistent structural shortages—such as health care and trades—and for emerging industries critical in growing a resilient economy.
• Despite its importance, a surge in immigration volumes in recent years, including rapid growth in the volume of non-permanent residents, increased the rate of population growth and has exacerbated existing pressures on services and infrastructure across the country, from housing and health care to education and social supports.
• The 2025–2027 Levels Plan took steps to respond to these pressures. Since tabling the Plan, the government has committed to reduce NPRs to less than 5% of the population by the end of 2027, and stabilize new PR admissions at less than 1% of Canada’s population beyond 2027.
• These commitments will be reflected in the 2026–2028 Levels Plan, which, after extensive consultations with partners, stakeholders and the public, including provinces and territories, will be tabled by November 1, 2025.

Responsive

Levels planning

• The Immigration and Refugee Protection Act requires that the immigration minister table the Annual Report to Parliament on Immigration, including the Immigration Levels Plan (Levels Plan) for the following year, by November 1, or within 30 sitting days if a House of Parliament is not sitting on November 1.
• By setting targets and planning ranges for each of the immigration categories, the Government of Canada establishes priorities among economic, social, and refugee objectives. Levels planning enables the Department and its partners to allocate processing, security, and settlement resources accordingly.

Temporary Resident Levels

• Targets include two major groups: international students and temporary workers admitted under either the International Mobility Program (IMP) or the Temporary Foreign Worker Program (TFWP). Targets only include new study and work permits (i.e., new people arriving as TRs each year).
• The IMP is comprised of a collection of streams that do not require a Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) and work permits can either be employer-specific or open. The TFWP is based on employer demand to fill specific jobs when no Canadians or permanent residents are available to do the work. An LMIA is required, and permits are tied to a sole employer.
• Recent efforts to reduce Canada’s NPR population have included a cap on most study permit applications, tightened controls on study permits and changes to the low and high-wage streams of the TFWP.

Permanent Resident Levels

• The 2025–2027 Levels Plan decreased overall PR admissions to respond to Canada’s shifting domestic context. More than 40% of overall PR admissions in 2025 are anticipated to be from students or workers already in Canada to alleviate pressure on communities’ capacity to welcome newcomers.
• Support for family reunification continues through the family category, with a rate of approximately 24% overall PR admissions in 2025, 23% in 2026 and 22% in 2027.
• Canada’s strong and proud tradition of offering protection to those most in need is evident through the resettled refugees and protected persons category rate of 15% of overall PR admissions.
• The Levels Plan established ambitious targets for French-speaking PR admissions: 8.5% of total admissions for 2025 (29,325), 9.5% (31,500) for 2026 and 10% (31,500) for 2027.

Supplementary Information

International Talent Strategy

• More needs to be done to ensure Canada’s immigration system is sustainable and responds to the current economic context. That is why the government is committed to attracting the best talent in the world to help build our economy while returning our overall immigration rates to sustainable levels.
• In some sectors, the highly skilled, specialized talent that Canadian businesses need to start, scale, and succeed is often in high demand but short supply, both in Canada and around the world.
• To compete for top talent, while respecting sustainable immigration levels, Canada must take a targeted and strategic approach to develop initiatives to support recruitment and retention in priority sectors, such as healthcare and skilled trades.

Economic Impact of Immigration

• Immigrants account for one in four health care sector workers.
  • More than 40% of newcomers to Canada between 2016 and 2021 who were working in the health care sector were employed in nursing, residential care facilities and home health care services.
• As of May 2021, immigrants aged 25 to 54 represented:
  • Over 20% of people working in construction;
  • Over 34% of those working in professional, scientific and technical services;
  • Nearly 38% of those working in the transportation and warehousing sector; and
  • Over 36% of those working in accommodation and food services.

Levels Plan Development and Consultation

• Each year, the Levels Plan is developed following extensive consultations, including engagement with PTs, partners, stakeholders, and the public. More specifically, engagement typically includes:
  • Provinces and territories (PTs): Engagement with PTs is conducted bilaterally and multilaterally, guided by the Joint Federal-Provincial-Territorial Immigration Levels Consultation Framework, as approved through the Forum of Ministers Responsible for Immigration.
  • Under the Canada-Quebec Accord, Quebec has responsibility for the selection of immigrants destined to the province (except Family Class and in-Canada refugee claimants). The Accord commits the federal government to take into consideration Quebec’s desired levels in all categories. Quebec’s immigration levels plan is established annually.
  • Stakeholder consultations: The Department conducts an annual consultation survey, which is shared with key stakeholders (e.g., business representatives, educational institutions, multicultural or ethno-cultural associations, municipalities, settlement or resettlement organizations, etc.). For the 2025–2027 Levels Plan, a total of 977 stakeholders completed the survey from the 6,772 invited.
  • Indigenous peoples: IRCC prioritizes engagement with Indigenous peoples and makes efforts to increase response rates from Indigenous organizations. For the 2025–2027 Levels Plan, the Department invited 479 individuals from First Nations, Métis and Inuit serving and/or representing organizations to provide feedback.
  • Public opinion: While public opinion research shows that Canadians still believe that immigrants make important contributions to Canada's economy and society, the proportion of Canadians who believe there are too many immigrants coming to Canada has risen substantially in 2024. On the other hand, some employers, post-secondary institutions, and small/medium sized communities are calling for more immigrants to meet their specific regional, economic and labour needs