A job offer from a designated employer in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island or Newfoundland and Labrador, and no labour market impact assessment. The route is real, but each province now runs it differently. Here is where it actually stands.
The Atlantic Immigration Program is open and it remains one of the most accessible permanent residence routes in Canada, with no points grid and no draw to win. But 2026 brought a smaller federal target and four very different provincial approaches. Knowing which province will actually endorse you matters more than meeting the federal criteria.
The 2026 to 2028 Levels Plan sets the Atlantic Immigration Program target at 4,000 admissions for 2026, with a range of 3,000 to 5,000. The 2025 target was 5,000.
Unlike Express Entry or a provincial nominee stream, there is no competitive score to beat. If you hold a qualifying job offer and meet the criteria, you are eligible. That is rare in 2026.
Effective 3 February 2026, Immigration New Brunswick paused acceptance of new employer designation applications while it reassesses existing designated employers. No end date has been published.
All three remain open, but none simply processes applications in the order they arrive.
Six questions against the actual federal criteria, plus the settlement funds you will need and what your chosen province is currently accepting.
What kind of job have you been offered?
The skill level of the job sets your language and education bar. If you do not have an offer yet, choose the level you expect to work at.
Do you have the work experience?
The requirement is 1,560 hours in the last five years, which is 30 hours a week for a year. Self-employment does not count.
What is your highest education?
Foreign credentials need an educational credential assessment less than five years old. Canadian credentials do not.
What is your English or French level?
Measured on the Canadian Language Benchmarks, in all four abilities. Your test result must be less than two years old.
Which province?
This is the most consequential answer. Each province is currently running the programme differently.
How many people are coming with you?
Count yourself, your spouse or partner, and any dependent children, whether or not they travel with you.
The federal criteria are identical across all four provinces. What differs is whether a province will designate your employer and endorse your offer, and in 2026 that varies enormously.
Open, and the province with the most published detail about how it selects. Since 28 November 2025 both employer designation and candidate endorsement are treated as expressions of interest, held in a pool until drawn rather than processed in the order received.
Open, with no pause notice anywhere on the provincial site, but rationed through a mechanism unique in Atlantic Canada: employers hold a finite number of designation spaces rather than an open designation.
Employer designation remains open, but endorsement, the step that actually matters, has been restricted to three sectors since 24 January 2025. The province states plainly that this follows a reduction in its federal allocation.
Effective 3 February 2026, Immigration New Brunswick paused acceptance of new employer designation applications, to reassess existing designated employers and evaluate its priorities. No end date has been published.
The requirement is 1,560 hours in the last five years, worked over a period of at least one year. That is 30 hours a week for a year, and it can be full time or part time.
If you studied in Atlantic Canada, the work experience requirement can be waived entirely. The conditions are specific.
Both bars are set by the skill level of your job offer, and both are low by Canadian standards.
| Language, TEER 0, 1, 2 or 3 | CLB 5 |
|---|---|
| Language, TEER 4 | CLB 4 |
| Test validity | Under 2 years |
| Education, TEER 0 or 1 | 1-year post-secondary or higher |
| Education, TEER 2, 3 or 4 | High school or higher |
| Credential assessment | Under 5 years old |
You must show you can support your household on arrival. These are the current amounts, in force since 29 July 2025.
| 1 person | $3,815 |
|---|---|
| 2 people | $4,750 |
| 3 people | $5,840 |
| 4 people | $7,090 |
| 5 people | $8,042 |
| 6 people | $9,070 |
| 7 people | $10,098 |
| Each additional person | $1,028 |
This is the heart of the programme, and the part you cannot complete alone.
Often overlooked, and it must be done before the province will endorse you.
Week 1
We check your work experience hours, education, language level and family size against the federal criteria, and just as importantly against what your target province is currently accepting. If New Brunswick is your plan and your employer is not already designated, you should hear that in the first conversation rather than six months in.
Weeks 2 to 8
Book an approved language test early, because results must be under two years old when you apply and everything else waits on them. If your credentials are foreign, start the educational credential assessment at the same time. Assessments must be less than five years old, and the turnaround from the designated bodies is rarely quick.
The longest stage, and the one nobody can shortcut
This is the real bottleneck. The employer must already be designated, or willing to become designated, which requires two years of continuous operation and two mandatory training courses. Not every province is accepting new designations. We help you target employers who are already designated in sectors the province is actually endorsing.
2 to 6 weeks once an employer says yes
The employer issues a Confirmation of Designation and the offer of employment form. Separately, you complete a needs and assets assessment with a designated settlement service provider, who prepares a settlement plan for you and for each accompanying family member. Both go into the endorsement package.
Varies enormously by province
The province reviews the package and, if satisfied, issues a Certificate of Endorsement. In Nova Scotia this comes through an expression of interest draw. In Newfoundland and Labrador you need an employer-issued invitation code and the employer then has 60 days to file. In Prince Edward Island the certificate goes to the employer, who forwards it to you.
About 26 months for the PR decision
You file the permanent residence application with IRCC. Because that wait is long, most people also apply for the optional two-year employer-specific work permit, which needs a referral letter from the province requested at endorsement. Your spouse or partner can apply for an open work permit alongside it, so the household can arrive and work while the application is processed.
Meeting the federal criteria is the easy part. New Brunswick has paused designations, Prince Edward Island endorses three sectors only, and Newfoundland employers hold expiring designation spaces. Advice that ignores this wastes years.
Several sites report the 2026 Atlantic target as an increase. It is a cut, from 5,000 places to 4,000, published in the Levels Plan on 4 November 2025. Every figure on this page is dated and sourced, so you can check it yourself.
We are regulated by the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants, which means a public register, mandatory professional insurance and a complaints process. Ask anyone advising you on a move across the world whether they can say the same.
Most applicants fail not on eligibility but on never finding a designated employer. We focus there, targeting employers already designated in occupations the province is currently endorsing, rather than sending applications into a queue that is closed.
Yes. There is no federal pause, cap or suspension on the programme itself, and the IRCC pages were last updated in May and June 2026.
What has changed is the size and the provincial gatekeeping. The 2026 to 2028 Levels Plan sets the target at 4,000 admissions for 2026, down from 5,000 in 2025, with the same 4,000 figure for 2027 and 2028. Several consultant sites report a 2026 increase. That is wrong, and the official plan is public.
Every restriction you will encounter is provincial rather than federal. New Brunswick paused employer designation on 3 February 2026, Prince Edward Island endorses only three sectors, Nova Scotia draws from a pool, and Newfoundland issues employers a limited number of designation spaces.
There is no points score to beat and no draw to win. If you hold a qualifying job offer and meet the criteria, you are eligible. In 2026 that is genuinely unusual.
The bars are also low. Language can be as little as CLB 4 for a TEER 4 job offer and CLB 5 for everything else. Education can be a high school diploma for TEER 2, 3 and 4 roles. Work experience is 1,560 hours over five years, which is one year at 30 hours a week, and graduates of Atlantic institutions are exempt from it entirely.
Your employer also does not need a labour market impact assessment, which removes the advertising, recruitment and $1,000 fee that an ordinary work permit route would involve.
IRCC currently publishes about 26 months for a permanent residence decision, last updated on 10 August 2026, with roughly 12,100 applicants waiting. That is the federal step only, and it starts once your application is filed.
Before that you need a designated employer, a job offer, a settlement plan and a provincial endorsement. Realistically the employer search is the longest and least predictable stage.
Because the wait is long, most applicants also take the optional two-year employer-specific work permit, which lets you move and start working while the permanent residence application is processed. Your spouse or partner can apply for an open work permit at the same time.
Honestly, this is the hardest part, and where most applications die. The employer must already be designated by the province, or be willing to become designated, which requires two years of continuous operation in the province, good standing under employment and safety law, and two mandatory free training courses.
Staffing agencies cannot be designated, and neither can a business you or your spouse majority own.
Be wary of anyone selling a job offer. Paying for an offer of employment is a serious problem, both for your application and for the employer. A genuine offer comes from a genuine vacancy.
Practically, we target employers who are already designated, in occupations the province is currently endorsing, which is a much shorter list than the general job market.
No, if you meet the graduate conditions. You need a credential from a programme of at least two years at a recognised institution in one of the four Atlantic provinces, obtained less than two years before you apply, having been a full-time student throughout and having lived in the province at least 16 months during the two years before graduating.
Two exclusions catch people. Programmes where English or French as a second language made up half or more of the study do not count, and neither do programmes that were half or more distance learning. A scholarship requiring you to return home also disqualifies you.
One correction worth making: being a graduate does not exempt you from settlement funds. The only funds exemption is for people already working in Canada on a valid work permit, which many graduates do meet through a post-graduation work permit, but it is a different test.
No. The IRCC criteria state the experience must be paid and cannot be self-employment. This catches out a surprising number of otherwise strong applicants, particularly consultants, freelancers and people who ran their own small business abroad.
Volunteer work and unpaid internships do not count either. The work must also be at the same skill level as your job offer or higher, and if it was done in Canada you must have held a valid work permit at the time.
There is one useful flexibility: experience as a licensed practical nurse or registered nurse can support a job offer as a nurse aide or home support worker, even though those sit at a lower skill level.
On the current picture, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland and Labrador are the most realistic. Both are open to new employer designations, and Nova Scotia publishes the most detail about how it selects.
Prince Edward Island works only if your occupation falls within health care, construction or manufacturing. Outside those three sectors it is not currently a route, no matter how strong your profile.
New Brunswick is the hardest right now. New employer designations have been paused since 3 February 2026 with no published end date, the entire accommodation and food services sector is excluded from endorsement, and candidates outside Canada are limited to provincially-led recruitment in health care, education and construction.
Sector matters as much as province. Health care and skilled trades are prioritised almost everywhere in Atlantic Canada.
It is a requirement people skip past, and then it delays them. Before the province will endorse you, a designated settlement service provider must complete a needs and assets assessment and prepare a personalised settlement plan.
The part that catches families out: a plan is needed for you and for every accompanying family member, not one for the household. Missing a spouse or child plan is a routine cause of an incomplete endorsement package.
The assessment can be done in person, online or by phone, and there are designated providers in each of the four provinces plus five that work with people still overseas. You send a copy to your employer for the endorsement package and include a copy in your permanent residence application.
Yes. Your spouse or common-law partner and dependent children can be included in the permanent residence application, and each accompanying family member needs their own settlement plan.
If you take the optional two-year work permit to move sooner, your spouse or common-law partner can apply for an open work permit, which lets them work for almost any employer rather than being tied to one.
Remember that settlement funds scale with family size, from $3,815 for one person to $7,090 for four, and the count includes family members even if they are not travelling with you immediately. Whether dependent children can obtain study permits alongside the Atlantic work permit is not addressed on the IRCC page, so we confirm that case by case rather than assuming.
Atlantic provinces have paused designations, cut sectors and changed draw volumes at short notice through 2026. Follow our journal so a change does not catch you mid-application.
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Atlantic provinces have paused designations, cut sectors and changed draw volumes at short notice through 2026. Follow our journal so a change does not catch you mid-application.
