Canada’s Immigration Numbers Revealed: Students Down 79%, Workers Down 74%, and a Seismic Shift Toward In-Canada Selection

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The numbers are in. On May 21, 2026, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) published its latest data dashboard tracking international student and temporary foreign worker volumes. The update, current to March 31, 2026, confirms what policy watchers have been predicting since the 2026-2028 Immigration Levels Plan was tabled: new arrivals have fallen off a cliff, the temporary resident stock is contracting, and the permanent residence system has fundamentally reoriented toward people already inside Canada.

This article unpacks every major number from the IRCC release, explains the policy machinery behind the trend, and offers a clear-eyed assessment of what the data means for anyone navigating Canadian immigration in 2026.

The Headline: 75% Fewer New Arrivals

IRCC reports that combined new student and worker arrivals between January and March 2026 totaled 145,625 fewer people compared to the same period in 2024. That is a 75 percent reduction.

Here is how that breaks down by category:

Metric	Jan-Mar 2024	Jan-Mar 2026	Decline
New student arrivals	~53,660	~11,195	79% (down 42,465)
New worker arrivals	~138,925	~35,765	74% (down 103,160)
Combined arrivals	~192,585	~46,960	75% (down 145,625)

These are not projections. They are actual arrival counts reported by IRCC. The government itself frames the numbers as proof that its restrictive measures are working: "The number of new students and workers arriving to Canada is declining, a clear sign that the measures we have put in place are working."

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Student Arrivals: A Near-Total Collapse

The monthly student arrival data is stark. In March 2026, only 2,085 new international students arrived in Canada. To put that in context:

Month	New Student Arrivals
December 2023	95,300
August 2024 (peak)	79,710
January 2025	11,215
August 2025	44,965
December 2025	9,530
January 2026	6,975
February 2026	2,135
March 2026	2,085

The seasonal spikes are still visible. August 2025 saw 44,965 arrivals ahead of the fall semester, consistent with the historical pattern. But the magnitude of those spikes has been crushed. August 2024 saw 79,710 arrivals. August 2025 saw 44,965. If the trend holds, August 2026 will be lower still.

Daily Hive reported in April 2026 that February's 2,135 arrivals represented a 48 percent decline from February 2025 and a 75 percent decline from February 2024. The March figure of 2,085 continues that downward trajectory.

The Policy Engine Behind the Student Decline

IRCC lists the specific measures that have produced these numbers:

1. Annual study permit caps introduced in 2024, tightened in 2025, and tightened again in 2026. The 2026-2028 Immigration Levels Plan targets only 155,000 new international student arrivals in 2026, compared to approximately 306,000 in the previous plan.
2. Mandatory acceptance letter verification to prevent study permit fraud.
3. Increased financial requirements for study permit applicants.
4. Provincial Attestation Letters (PALs) required for most post-secondary applicants.

The total study permit issuance for 2026 is capped at 408,000, but that figure includes 253,000 extensions for students already in Canada. Only 155,000 are for genuinely new arrivals.

Worker Arrivals: The 74 Percent Drop

New worker arrivals follow a similar trajectory. In March 2026, 13,910 new workers entered Canada (3,500 through the Temporary Foreign Worker Program and 10,410 through the International Mobility Program).

The data shows that worker arrivals are more evenly distributed across months than student arrivals, lacking the dramatic pre-semester spikes. But the absolute volume has been steadily compressed:

Month	New Worker Arrivals
March 2024	63,640
January 2025	14,875
March 2025	18,495
December 2025	9,695
January 2026	11,785
February 2026	10,840
March 2026	13,910

The March 2024 figure of 63,640 included a massive 56,090 IMP entries. By March 2026, IMP entries had fallen to 10,410. That is an 81 percent reduction in the IMP stream alone.

Policy Drivers on the Worker Side

IRCC and Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) have deployed multiple restrictive measures simultaneously:

1. A 10 percent cap on low-wage TFW hiring per worksite (20 percent in select in-demand sectors).
2. A halt on low-wage LMIA processing in census metropolitan areas with unemployment at or above 6 percent.
3. LMIA validity shortened from 18 months to 6 months in 2026.
4. TFW admission targets cut by 27 percent, from 82,000 to 60,000 spots for 2026.
5. PGWP eligibility tightened, with the field-of-study list frozen for 2026, meaning 178 programs that lost eligibility remain ineligible.
6. Spousal work permits restricted for partners of international students and temporary foreign workers.
7. Further reductions built into the 2026-2028 Levels Plan, which targets only 385,000 total new temporary resident arrivals in 2026, down from 673,650 in 2025.

The Stock: How Many Are Still Here

While the arrival numbers capture the flow of new entrants, the stock data reveals how many temporary residents remain in Canada on any given date. As of March 31, 2026, the totals are:

Category	Number of Permit Holders
Study permit only	431,160
Work permit only	1,510,580
Both study and work permits	228,915

The study-permit-only stock has fallen from a peak of 679,675 in January 2024 to 431,160. That is a drop of nearly 250,000 people, or roughly 37 percent, over approximately 26 months.

The work-permit-only stock has moved in the opposite direction. It stood at 1,233,155 in December 2023. By March 2026, it had climbed to 1,510,580, an increase of approximately 277,000. This reflects the accumulation of workers who arrived in prior years, many of whom are now pursuing permanent residence or have obtained permit extensions. The stock has not yet begun to decline meaningfully because, as IRCC itself notes, "inventories of existing applications continue to be processed under the rules that were in place when they were submitted."

The dual-permit category (students who also hold a work permit, typically through co-op or post-graduation work) has fallen from a peak of 373,685 in June 2024 to 228,915. That is a 39 percent decline and aligns with the shrinking international student pipeline.

The broader temporary resident population, which includes asylum claimants and protected persons not captured in these permit numbers, peaked at 3,149,131 on October 1, 2024 and had fallen to 2,676,441 by January 1, 2026, according to Statistics Canada data cited by Immigration.ca. The government's stated goal is to reduce the temporary population to below 5 percent of Canada's total population.

TR to PR: The Majority of New Permanent Residents Are Already Here

The most significant structural shift in Canadian immigration is hiding in plain sight in the IRCC data. Former temporary residents now account for the majority of new permanent residents:

Period	Former TRs Who Became PRs	% of Total New PRs
2024	215,090	44%
2025	188,820	48%
2026 (Jan-Mar)	49,310	59%

In the first quarter of 2026, nearly three out of every five new permanent residents were already living in Canada on a temporary permit before being granted PR. This is not accidental. IRCC has explicitly prioritized in-Canada candidates through Express Entry draws, with the majority of 2026 rounds targeting Canadian Experience Class and Provincial Nominee Program candidates already working in the country.

The In-Canada Workers Initiative: 5,800 Admitted So Far

A major component of the TR-to-PR pipeline is the one-time In-Canada Workers Initiative, announced in Budget 2025 and detailed in a May 4, 2026 news release. The program will fast-track permanent residence for up to 33,000 workers across 2026 and 2027, with a particular focus on smaller communities.

Key numbers as of March 31, 2026:

• 2026 target: 20,000 workers
• Admitted January to March: 5,800
• Progress toward target: 29%

The program is running ahead of the pace needed to hit 20,000 by year-end. Between January 1 and February 28 alone, 3,600 workers were granted PR. Adding March brings the total to 5,800 in three months, putting the initiative on track to exceed its annual target if the current pace continues.

Eligible applicants must have:

• Applied for PR through the Provincial Nominee Program, Atlantic Immigration Program, community immigration pilots, caregiver pilots, or the AgriFood Pilot.
• Lived in smaller communities in Canada for at least two years.

Critically, applicants do not need to take any action. IRCC is pulling eligible cases from existing application inventories and accelerating them. This is not a new application stream. It is a processing priority applied to cases already in the system.

What This Means for Different Applicant Groups

For International Students Outside Canada

The 2026 cap of 155,000 new study permits represents a reduction of roughly 50 percent from the 306,000 originally planned for 2026 under the previous levels plan. Competition for study permit slots is intense. Provincial Attestation Letters are mandatory for most post-secondary applicants. The financial requirements have increased. Acceptance letters are now verified before permits are issued. If you are considering studying in Canada, expect a far more rigorous application process than existed before 2024, and plan for the possibility that your chosen institution or program may not have sufficient PAL allocation.

For Temporary Residents Already in Canada

The data validates what many have sensed: being inside Canada is an increasingly powerful advantage. With 59 percent of new PRs coming from former temporary residents in Q1 2026, and with IRCC running CEC-focused Express Entry draws and the In-Canada Workers Initiative, the pathway from temporary status to permanent residence is more structured and more heavily used than at any point in recent history.

However, the shrinking stock of study permit holders and the tightening of PGWP eligibility mean that the pipeline feeding the in-Canada pool is being deliberately narrowed. Fewer international students arriving today means fewer PGWP holders and fewer CEC candidates three to five years from now.

For Employers Relying on Temporary Foreign Workers

The 27 percent cut to TFW admission targets, the shortened 6-month LMIA validity, the 10 percent low-wage cap per worksite, and the regional unemployment trigger at 6 percent all create a significantly more restrictive hiring environment. Employers who relied on low-wage TFWs in high-unemployment metropolitan areas have effectively lost access to the program. The government's stated policy is Canadian workers first, with foreign workers as a last resort.

For Provincial Nominee Program Candidates

The PNP remains a primary vehicle for TR-to-PR transitions, but the landscape varies dramatically by province. As the New Brunswick case demonstrated earlier in 2026, individual provinces can and do impose occupation restrictions, sector exclusions, and pathway closures with minimal notice. Candidates should monitor their specific province's allocation and occupation priorities closely.

The Bigger Picture: Is the 5 Percent Target Achievable?

The government has committed to reducing the temporary resident population to less than 5 percent of Canada's total population. The TR population has already fallen from approximately 3.15 million in October 2024 to approximately 2.68 million in January 2026, a reduction of roughly 473,000 people.

The 2026-2028 Levels Plan targets new TR arrivals of 385,000 in 2026 and 370,000 in 2027 and 2028, down from 673,650 in 2025. The plan also projects a net reduction of approximately 445,662 temporary residents in 2026 alone.

Whether the 5 percent target is hit by the end of 2027 depends on several variables: how many existing temporary residents successfully transition to PR and exit the TR count; how many voluntarily leave Canada when their permits expire; and whether asylum claimant volumes, which are not directly controlled through planning, continue to add pressure.

What is clear from the March 31, 2026 data is that the arrival side of the equation has been decisively addressed. New student and worker entries are at levels not seen since before the post-pandemic surge. The more difficult challenge is managing the stock of people already here, and that will play out over the next 18 to 24 months.

Data Notes and Caveats

IRCC provides several important qualifications about its data:

• All values between 0 and 5 are suppressed and shown as a double dash to prevent individual identification.
• All other values are rounded to the nearest multiple of 5.
• The arrival data excludes asylum claimants, permit extensions, seasonal agricultural workers, and TFWs present for 270 days or less whose start and end dates fall within the same calendar year.
• "Arrivals" are counted based on the number of people issued a study or work permit in that month. If someone received both permits in the same month, they are counted under the study permit group.
• The total stock numbers reflect permit holders on the last day of each month. They exclude asylum claimants, protected persons, and related groups who may hold study or work permits.

Source

All data in this article is drawn from IRCC's official "Key numbers on Canadian immigration" page, data as of March 31, 2026, supplemented by the May 4, 2026 news release on the In-Canada Workers Initiative, the 2026-2028 Immigration Levels Plan, and publicly reported figures from Statistics Canada, Daily Hive, BBC News Pidgin, CIC News, and other outlets as cited inline.

This article is for informational purposes and does not constitute legal or immigration advice. Policies can change. Always verify current requirements on the official IRCC website.

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