Canada’s population shrank by 103,000 in 2025

There were 103,000 fewer people resident in Canada at the start of 2026 than on January, 1 2025 according to Statistics Canada data released Wednesday.

The lower population has been driven by a falling rate of natural population increase, falling immigration, and a falling number of people in Canada on a work or study permit and without permanent residency.

Is depopulation worsening economic challenges?

This morning’s data comes after StatsCan Labour Force Survey reported that for a second month the number of employed workers in Canada fell as did the number of workers in the labour market, which includes those looking for work. In February the unemployment rate increased while the participation rate decreased, a double-negative trend.

Without doubt, there are many factors affecting Canada’s job losses, particularly Trump’s tariff attack and the housing construction melt-down. What is less clear from public analysis is whether depopulation is among the factors.

The specific relationship between recent jobs loss and recent population decline hasn’t been much analyzed in the public sphere. But, in theory, a higher population does lead to more consumer spending, which sustains about two-thirds of Canadian GDP. Depopulation means less fewer consumers and may be another factor behind falling employment.

Top impact: fewer work and study permit holders

The number of people in Canada on study or work permit and without permanent residency fell by 495,029 from January 1, 2025 to January 1, 2026.

Unfortunately, Statistics Canada data doesn’t show data on people in Canada on permits before 2021. In spring 2022 the Government of Canada, at the urging of business organizations and premiers, announced increases to the number of both work and study permits. Permit holders began to increase Q3 2022, peaking Q4 2024.

>Data Showshas emphasized many times that the massive increase in the cost of housing, which occurred from mid-2020 to Q1 2022, pre-dates the increase in permit holders. In fact, from Q3 2022 to Q4 2024, when the number of permit holders was increasing, the cost of housing was falling in major markets.

Purchase and rent prices continue to fall, now four years after the peak, with large employment consequences. Data Shows emphasises this point because pointing at immigrants has frequently been used to deflect from a terrible market failure that remains greatly under-explored.

Continued slower net immigration

In 2025, Canada’s population through immigration increased by 328,046, the lowest net immigration increase since the onset of the pandemic. Through the year, 65,706 more people with a permanent residency right in Canada left Canada than returned to it. And 393,753 people immigrated to Canada.

Net immigration peaked in 2024 at 419,202. While net emigration was almost unchanged between 2024 and 2025, immigration dropped by about 89,900.

In Q4 2025 the number of immigrants was 83,200, mid-pack to the numbers in the five years before the pandemic.

Natural population growth has come to a halt

Aside from the spike in deaths and a fall in births during the pandemic, in Q4 2025 for the fist time the number of deaths exceeded the number of births. It was a significant point but not a change from a long-term trend.

Still, Canada’s natural population increase in 2025 was 31,206 people.

There were about 370,000 births and 340,000 deaths.

Births are almost higher in Q3 while deaths are almost always higher in Q1, the pandemic period excepted.