Is the Start-up Visa program still open?

No. IRCC lists the program as paused. It is closed to all applicants except those with a valid 2025 commitment certificate who applied by June 30, 2026. Check the official IRCC page for the current position.

What is the Start-up Visa approval rate?

IRCC publishes admissions and processing data, not a single approval rate by year. The rates in the old version of this article came from our own 2021 data set and are not official, so we have removed them from the main statistics.

What replaces the Start-up Visa?

IRCC has said a new, targeted pilot program for immigrant entrepreneurs will be detailed in 2026. IRCC briefing material calls it the High Impact Start-up Pilot. As of our review date (November 8, 2026) we found no launch date or criteria on canada.ca.

Startup Visa Canada Statistics and Status

Status note, reviewed 2026-11-08. IRCC lists the federal Start-up Visa Program as paused. It is closed to all applications except those from applicants who hold a valid 2025 commitment certificate and applied by June 30, 2026. The optional Start-up Visa work permit has been closed to new applicants since December 19, 2025; existing holders may extend. IRCC has said a new, targeted pilot program for immigrant entrepreneurs will be detailed in 2026. Sources: IRCC, Start-up Visa (page dated July 21, 2026) and IRCC notice of December 19, 2025. The December notice set December 31, 2025 as the end of general intake; the later page gives June 30, 2026 as the last date for holders of a 2025 commitment certificate. That date has now passed.

Wealth Theory no longer works on Start-up Visa applications. We keep this page because people still look for the program’s numbers and it has been linked to since 2021. It is informational only and is not immigration advice. Speak to a licensed immigration consultant or lawyer about your own situation.

What the program was

The Start-up Visa Program began as a pilot under Ministerial Instructions issued on March 30, 2013 (IRCC, MI7). IRCC announced in 2017 that it would become a permanent program in 2018 (IRCC, July 2017). It offered permanent residence to entrepreneurs with a qualifying business backed by a designated organization (a venture capital fund, angel investor group or business incubator).

Statistics from official sources

IRCC publishes permanent resident admissions by immigration category, including Start-up Visa, in its open data set. That is the source to use for admission counts.

Measure	Figure	Source and date
Start-up Business class permanent resident admissions, 2024	About 5,500	IRCC open data, data to August 31, 2026, extracted November 8, 2026
Start-up Business class admissions, 2025	About 1,400	Same
Start-up Business class admissions, January to August 2026	About 170	Same
Cumulative admissions, 2015 to August 2026	About 10,500	Same
Planned admissions 2026 to 2028, Federal Business category (Start-up Visa and Self-Employed Persons combined)	500 a year (range 250 to 1,000)	IRCC, Supplementary information for the 2026-2028 Levels Plan, page dated October 13, 2026

How to read the admissions figures: they count people admitted as permanent residents (applicants and their family members), not applications approved. IRCC rounds each monthly figure by province to the nearest 5 and hides values under 6, so our totals add rounded figures and are approximate. Source: IRCC permanent residents by province and immigration category, described on the open.canada.ca dataset page. For a precise figure, request IRCC’s data directly.

Older figures (2021, dated)

The first version of this article (October 2021) included analysis from data Wealth Theory obtained directly: approvals by nationality for 2015 to the first quarter of 2021, and yearly approval rates between 63% and 99%. That data set has not been refreshed, it is not an official IRCC publication, and it should not be read as current. We could not verify the nationality breakdown or the approval rates against any IRCC publication: IRCC’s open data counts admissions, not approvals or refusals, and it does not publish a yearly approval rate for the program. For that reason the figures are not repeated here. [NEEDS HASAN: keep the 2021 data as a clearly dated appendix, or drop it. If kept, it still cannot be sourced to IRCC.]

How the program changed

2013: pilot launched (March 30, 2013 Ministerial Instructions).
2018: made a permanent program, as announced by IRCC in 2017.
December 19, 2025: IRCC announced the optional Start-up Visa work permit was closed to new applicants (people already in Canada could still extend) and that general intake would stop at 11:59 p.m. on December 31, 2025, except for applicants with a valid 2025 commitment from a designated organization. The same notice extended the pause on the Self-Employed Persons Program until further notice.
June 30, 2026: last date for applicants with a valid 2025 commitment certificate to apply, per the IRCC program page.
2026: IRCC says a replacement pilot for immigrant entrepreneurs will be detailed. The IRCC Deputy Minister transition binder (2026) calls it the “High Impact Start-up Pilot” and describes it as planned. As of November 8, 2026 we found no launch date or eligibility criteria.

Other business-based routes

Several provinces run their own entrepreneur streams. Their status changes, so check each official page. Our BC PNP business plan guide and overview of business plans for immigration programs describe what those plans must contain. To estimate a score in the BC stream, see the BC PNP Entrepreneur points calculator.

Questions about this page: contact us.

Start-up Visa Canada statistics and current status Draft