How Much Does Daycare Cost in Canada? (2026)

A full-time space in a Canadian daycare centre costs an average of $435 a month, and that average won’t tell you what you’ll pay. What you pay is set by your province, and the range runs from $9.65 a day in Quebec to $52 a day in Richmond, British Columbia. Same country, same federal program, more than five times the bill. So the useful answer to how much daycare costs in Canada is a provincial one, and it comes with a second cost nobody puts in the headline: the months you spend waiting for a space.

How much does daycare cost in Canada?

A full-time space in a licensed daycare centre averages $435 a month across Canada, down from $508 in 2023, according to Statistics Canada’s 2025 child care survey (opens in a new tab). Fees fell because of the Canada-wide early learning and child care agreements signed with every province and territory in 2021 and 2022.

Those agreements set a national goal of $10 a day on average by 2026. The money flows from Ottawa, but each province decides how to spend it, and that one design choice is why the bill for the same baby looks so different across a provincial border.

Home daycare is no longer the cheap option

Home-based care costs $534 a month on average, against $435 for a centre, and it’s the one figure in the Statistics Canada survey that didn’t fall between 2023 and 2025.

If you grew up assuming a neighbourhood home daycare undercuts the big centre down the road, that assumption is worth retesting with two phone calls. It may still be true in your city. It’s no longer true on average.

What does daycare cost in each province?

Six provinces and territories now charge a set fee of $10 a day or less. Ontario caps infant fees at $22 a day, Alberta sets its at $15, and four places still leave the price to each daycare, with a provincial or territorial subsidy covering part of it. The figures below come from the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives’ annual fee survey (opens in a new tab), published in August 2026, which covers infant care in 35 cities. Monthly figures are the daily fee over about 21.7 care days, the same arithmetic the survey uses.

Infant fees have reached $10 a day in 11 of the 35 cities surveyed. British Columbia holds both ends of the national range: $28 a day in Kelowna, $52 in Richmond. Quebec’s $9.65 is the lowest in the country, and it comes from a provincial program that started at $5 a day in 1997, long before Ottawa got involved. The rate is indexed every January 1 (opens in a new tab), so it rises a few cents a year.

Why Ottawa counts eight provinces at $10 a day and the survey counts six

Both numbers are right, and they measure different things. Ottawa’s progress map (opens in a new tab) counts a jurisdiction once its average fee falls to $10 a day or less, which is how Yukon and the Northwest Territories make the list. The fee survey counts provinces that have set a fee at that level, which those two territories haven’t. Their daycares still name their own price, and a territorial subsidy brings the average down.

The practical lesson holds anywhere fees aren’t capped. Ask the daycare what you’ll be billed, and treat any provincial average as background.

The cost the fee doesn’t cover: finding a space

When fees fell, far more families went looking for a space than the system had room for. Among parents who weren’t using child care in 2025, 31% had a child aged 0 to 5 on a waiting list, up from 26% in 2023. For babies under one it was 56%, up from 47%, though Statistics Canada notes many of those are put on a list early, for a spot the family won’t need until later.

Half of the parents who did find care said it was hard. Asked what made it hard, 65% named availability, 42% named affordability, and 35% named getting a subsidized space.

What that costs you

A waiting list has a price even though nobody invoices you for it. It’s paid in unpaid leave, a delayed return to work, a nanny for three months, or a grandparent driving across town. Ottawa’s target was 250,000 new spaces by March 2026, and more than 200,000 had been announced as of December 2025. More spaces are opening. There still aren’t enough.

The practical response is to start early. Put your name down before the baby arrives if your city lets you, and put it down at more than one place.

What does daycare cost after the tax deduction?

Less than the sticker price. The child care expense deduction (opens in a new tab) lets you deduct up to $8,000 a year for each child under seven, $5,000 for a child aged 7 to 15, and $11,000 for a child eligible for the disability tax credit.

An Ontario family paying $22 a day for an infant space spends about $5,700 over a year, under the $8,000 ceiling. That ceiling isn’t the only limit. Your claim is capped at the lowest of the annual amount for the child’s age, what you actually paid, and two-thirds of the claiming parent’s earned income. In the year someone goes back to work part-way through, that third limit is often the one that applies.

This is a deduction rather than a credit, so it comes off the income you’re taxed on, and what it’s worth depends on your bracket.

The claim generally has to go on the return of the spouse or common-law partner with the lower net income, even if the higher earner paid every invoice, with exceptions for school, illness and separation. You can also only claim fees paid so you could work, run a business or study, which is why a space you hold and pay for during parental leave doesn’t qualify.

How much should you save before daycare starts?

Take your local monthly fee and multiply it by three. That’s the cushion that covers a deposit, the first month, and the gap between your leave ending and your first full pay arriving.

In Quebec that’s about $630. In Ontario it’s roughly $1,430. In Richmond it’s closer to $3,400. Then, if you’re heading back to work after a leave, add the difference between your benefit payments and your regular pay for the overlap month, because those two rarely line up neatly. Our guide to saving for a baby works through the leave-income gap in more detail, and what university costs in Canada picks the story up eighteen years later.

Saving for daycare, with a draw attached

Saving toward a bill that starts in eight months is a long, flat stretch with nothing happening in it. Lodavo is a free Canadian app that puts something in that stretch. Connect the savings account you already use, and every $25 of your balance earns you a free ticket in a weekly draw for up to $10,000, with a prize of at least $100 going to someone every week. Your money stays in your own bank the whole time.

The money still ends up where you were sending it. The difference is that you get a Sunday to look forward to on the way there.

Start the list and the cushion at the same time

The fee is decided for you. Your province picked it, and no amount of shopping around changes a capped rate. The two things you do control are when you get on a waiting list and how much you have set aside before the first invoice arrives, and starting early helps with both. Look up your city’s real number, multiply it by three, and work backwards from the month your leave ends. For the wider habit, our guide to how to save money in Canada covers the rest.

Ready to make saving more interesting? Download Lodavo free on the Apple App Store (opens in a new tab) or Google Play Store (opens in a new tab) and start earning tickets for the weekly draw.

This article is general information, not tax advice. For your own situation, check with the Canada Revenue Agency or an accountant.

Terms and conditions apply. No purchase necessary (alternate method of entry available). Skill-testing question required. Open to legal residents of Canada who are the age of majority. Odds depend on the number of eligible entries received. Full rules and odds at our contest rules.