Money Mart alternatives in Canada (2026): cheaper than $14 per $100

Money Mart charges $14 for every $100 on a payday loan, and that’s the legal ceiling, so no licensed lender will undercut it. The alternatives to Money Mart that genuinely cost less charge no interest at all: Bree up to $750, KOHO Cover up to $500 inside a spending account, Nyble up to $250. iCash charges the same as Money Mart but pays some of it back. Prices for all five are in the table above.

Why look for a Money Mart alternative?

People rarely leave Money Mart over the price, because the price is fixed by law and every licensed payday lender charges the same $14 per $100. The reasons that do move someone are concrete: wanting to borrow without a credit check, living somewhere Money Mart doesn’t lend, or working out that the fast loan costs more than the slow one at the same company. Plenty of readers haven’t borrowed from anyone yet and are deciding where to start.

The $14 is set by law, so no lender undercuts it

Since January 1, 2025, the Criminal Interest Rate Regulations (opens in a new tab) have capped the total cost of borrowing under a payday loan agreement at 14% of the amount advanced. Money Mart charges exactly that, and so does every other licensed lender in the country. So there’s no cheaper payday lender to find.

What the fee works out to a year depends only on how long the loan runs, and Money Mart publishes the spread itself: 365% on a 14-day loan in Ontario, British Columbia and Saskatchewan, 425.83% on a 12-day loan in Manitoba, and 121.67% over the 42 days Alberta allows a weekly-paid borrower. The fee is the same. Only the number of days changes. Our guide to what payday loans cost in Canada runs the rules province by province.

The same lender’s installment loan costs a fraction of its payday loan

Money Mart publishes both prices on its rates and terms page (opens in a new tab). Its installment loan (opens in a new tab) runs $500 to $25,000 over 6 to 84 months at 34.56% to 34.95% a year. Its payday loan (opens in a new tab) runs $100 to $1,500 for 14 days or more at $14 per $100.

Put $1,000 through each. On the payday product you repay $1,140, and it’s due on your next payday. On the installment product at 34.95%, six monthly payments of about $184 come to roughly $1,104. The slower loan costs less over six months than the fast one costs over two weeks.

There are real reasons the installment loan isn’t always available to you. It involves a credit check, the minimum is $500, and the shortest term is six months, so it’s no use for a $200 gap on a Thursday. But if you were going to borrow $1,000 and roll it over, you can get the cheaper product from the same lender.

The best Money Mart alternatives in Canada, at a glance

Three apps advance smaller amounts and charge no interest. One licensed lender matches Money Mart’s price and beats it on speed. Behind the table, here is how each one works and who it actually suits.

Bree, for the largest 0% advance

Bree (opens in a new tab) advances up to $750 against your next pay, charges no interest and adds no late fee. Standard delivery takes one to three business days and costs nothing, and the optional membership is $2.99 a month. Approval comes from reading the last two months of your chequing account for consistent income, government benefits included, rather than from a credit score.

A $750 Money Mart loan costs $105 in fees. The same $750 from Bree costs nothing, as long as you can wait. Bree’s Google Play listing puts express delivery between $2.99 and $45.99, scaled to the size of the advance, and on a small advance that’s a big share of the money.

The bigger limit is geography. Bree isn’t accepting new customers in Quebec, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia or New Brunswick, so for readers in those four provinces it isn’t an option at all.

Nyble, for a free line that builds credit

Nyble (opens in a new tab) opens an interest-free line of $30 to $250 with no hard credit check, and reports the repayments to Equifax as a credit account on your file. The free plan carries both the line and the reporting. An $11.99 monthly membership adds faster payments and a few protections and changes nothing about what reaches the bureau, so paying for it won’t improve your file.

At $250 the line covers a phone bill, not rent, and qualifying needs more than $1,000 a month landing in your account. The reporting also runs both ways. Nyble’s own credit-building page says it has to report late payments as well as on-time ones.

Nyble is the pick if you’re borrowing small amounts anyway and would rather those months counted for something. Nothing about a repaid Money Mart loan reaches Equifax or TransUnion.

KOHO Cover, for a buffer inside a spending account

Cover (opens in a new tab) reaches $500, which is the most any 0% option here will lend you short of Bree, and the money is in your KOHO balance the moment it’s approved. No credit check. KOHO does say the $500 is a ceiling rather than an entitlement: an automated system sets your own limit from your account history, and support can’t raise it if you ask.

Where it differs from Bree is who pays and when. Cover is a monthly subscription from $2, charged on top of a KOHO plan that runs $0 to $22 a month, and it keeps charging in the months you borrow nothing. Bree takes its money only in the weeks you actually borrow. So Cover is cheap if you borrow most months and the worst value here if you borrow twice a year.

It makes sense if you want the spending account anyway. If all you want is a few hundred dollars before payday, Nyble costs nothing, though it stops at $250.

iCash, when you need more than the apps will advance

iCash (opens in a new tab) is a licensed payday lender, the same product class as Money Mart, at the same $14 per $100. It’s on this page because the money arrives by Interac e-Transfer within minutes instead of during branch hours, and because it lends in one province Money Mart doesn’t. It also runs a cashback scheme, which is worth less than it sounds: 4% of the borrowing cost back on your first ten repaid loans, 8% on the next ten, and the headline 12% only from your twenty-first. That’s twenty repaid loans before the headline rate ever applies.

It lends $100 to $1,500 in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario and Prince Edward Island. New Brunswick is the one that matters, because Money Mart’s disclosures exclude it. If you’re there, read the cashback terms first: iCash doesn’t offer it in New Brunswick or Manitoba at all.

Moving from Money Mart to iCash buys you speed on an identical fee. It doesn’t make the loan cheap.

Lodavo, for the week after the loan is repaid

Lodavo doesn’t lend and doesn’t advance anything, so it’s no help with a bill due Friday. It belongs on this page for a different reason. Most people reading it are not taking their first payday loan. Consumer Protection BC’s aggregate lender data (opens in a new tab) works out to 4.7 loans per borrower over the 2025 reporting year, and what ends that pattern isn’t a cheaper loan.

Lodavo is Canada’s first prize-linked savings app, and it’s free. It connects to a bank account you already have, and every $25 sitting in it earns you a free ticket in that week’s cash draw. Prizes go up to $10,000, and at least $100 goes to someone every week. There’s nothing to repay.

It’s on a page about payday loans because of what the second loan costs. Borrowing $300 works once. It stops working when repaying it makes next week short as well, and at that point being told to save is useless advice. Lodavo asks for the opposite: leave $100 where it is, and that’s four tickets in this week’s draw. You can see who has won and how the draw is verified before you sign up.

How to choose the right Money Mart alternative

Start from whichever line below describes you:

Under $750, the apps win and it isn’t close, because they charge no interest. Above $750 you’re choosing between licensed lenders at an identical fee, and the question becomes how long you need the money. Anything you can’t clear on your next payday belongs on an installment loan, from Money Mart or anyone else, rather than rolled over at $14 per $100.

What if none of these will lend to you?

All of the above want to see regular income, and a fair number of people reading this won’t clear that bar. Four things are worth trying before a payday loan, and none of them costs $14 per $100:

• Ask whoever you owe. Utilities, telecoms, landlords, municipalities and hospitals all run payment arrangements, and most would rather hold the account than send it to collections. The Financial Consumer Agency of Canada (opens in a new tab) lists this first for the same reason.
• Ask your employer. Plenty of Canadian employers will advance pay you have already earned, and it usually costs nothing at all.
• Try a credit union. Several offer small emergency loans to members at ordinary consumer rates, and membership is often open to anyone in the province.
• Check your province. Most run emergency or crisis benefits for a specific bill, particularly utility arrears, and they are grants rather than loans.

If the borrowing is monthly rather than occasional, none of this page fixes it, and a non-profit credit counsellor is free to talk to. How to build an emergency fund in Canada covers reaching the first few hundred dollars, which is the amount that breaks the cycle.

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.