The question we are asked most often, usually a little sheepishly, is how much a trip to Canada actually costs. The honest answer is that it depends enormously on where you go and how you travel, but vague answers are no help when you are deciding between two weeks and three. So here is our attempt at real numbers, in Canadian dollars, with the habits and hidden charges that make a visitor’s budget run higher than planned. Prices change, and have moved noticeably in recent years, so treat these as orders of magnitude rather than quotes.
The price on the tag is not the price
This is the first surprise. Prices displayed in shops, on menus and on hotel websites do not include sales tax. Tax is added at the till, and it varies by province: a federal tax everywhere, plus a provincial tax in most places, combined in some provinces into a single harmonized rate. The total ranges from about five percent in the lowest-tax territories to roughly fifteen percent in the highest. Some provinces add further hotel or tourism levies on accommodation.
The practical effect is that a meal listed at forty dollars is closer to forty-six with tax before the tip, and a hotel room advertised at two hundred is two hundred and thirty or more. Build a mental ten to fifteen percent onto every printed price and you will not be caught out. There is no general tax refund for visitors.
Tipping is expected, not optional
Tipping is an ingrained part of Canadian service culture and staff in restaurants and bars rely on it. The norm at a sit-down restaurant is fifteen to twenty percent of the bill before tax, with fifteen the floor for adequate service and eighteen to twenty increasingly common in cities. Card terminals usually present suggested percentages, and some now start the suggestions higher than the norm; you can always choose your own amount. A dollar or two per drink at a bar, ten to fifteen percent for taxis and ride shares, a few dollars per day for hotel housekeeping and a tip for guides on a tour are all standard.
Counter service does not require a tip, though the terminal will ask. For a couple eating out twice a day, tipping alone adds something like thirty to fifty dollars a day. It belongs in the budget as a line item, not as an afterthought.
Getting around: fuel, cars and distances
Fuel is sold by the litre and priced in the range of roughly a dollar and a half to two dollars, higher in remote areas and on the west coast, lower on the Prairies. Because distances are long, fuel is a bigger share of a road trip budget than most visitors expect: a mid-sized car covering three thousand kilometres over two weeks will burn several hundred dollars of fuel. Rental rates swing with the season and the city, with peak summer rates in popular gateway cities well above the off-season, and mandatory insurance products and one-way fees adding considerably.
Public transit in the big cities is cheap by comparison, a few dollars per ride or a day pass for the price of a coffee and a sandwich. Intercity buses and trains are moderate over short distances and expensive over long ones. Regional flights to the North can cost more than the international flight that brought you here.
Parks, activities and the rest
National park entry is charged per day per adult, capped per vehicle for families, and the annual pass pays for itself on trips of roughly a week or more in the parks. Campsites in national parks run from around thirty dollars a night for a basic site to over fifty for a serviced one, plus the reservation fee. Guided activities are where budgets stretch: a half-day guided hike or paddle, a whale-watching trip or a glacier tour typically land between one hundred and two hundred and fifty dollars a person, and multi-day guided trips in the wilderness run into the thousands.
- Hostel dorm bed: forty to seventy dollars a night in cities, more in the mountain resort towns.
- Budget motel or basic hotel room: one hundred and twenty to two hundred dollars.
- Mid-range hotel or a good bed and breakfast: two hundred to three hundred and fifty.
- Lodge, resort or a premium mountain hotel in peak season: four hundred to well over a thousand.
- Campsite: thirty to sixty dollars, before the reservation fee.
Food, from groceries to a nice dinner
Groceries are noticeably more expensive than in many countries, and in the North they are startling. Self-catering in a city might cost fifteen to twenty-five dollars a person per day; in a remote northern community, double that. Eating out, a casual lunch is fifteen to twenty-five dollars with tax and tip, a mid-range dinner for two with a drink each lands between one hundred and one hundred and sixty, and a serious restaurant is two hundred and up. Alcohol is heavily taxed and sold through government or licensed stores in most provinces, so a bottle of wine or a case of beer costs more than you may be used to, and restaurant markups are high.
Shoulder seasons and the numbers that add up
The biggest lever on a Canadian budget is timing. Late May to early June and September to early October are the shoulder seasons in most of the country. Hotel rates in the mountain towns and on the coasts can be thirty to fifty percent lower than in July and August, rental cars are cheaper and easier to find, and the campsites that sold out in minutes have space. The weather is usually still good, the bugs are gone in September, and the autumn colours in the east are among the finest sights the country offers. Winter is the cheapest season everywhere except the ski towns, which have their own peak.
So what does it add up to? For a couple travelling carefully, staying in hostels and budget motels, self-catering and using transit or a shared rental, about one hundred and fifty to two hundred dollars a person per day is realistic. A comfortable mid-range trip with a rental car, decent hotels and one guided activity every few days runs three hundred to four hundred and fifty a person per day. A trip built around lodges, fine dining and the famous mountain hotels in peak season can easily double that. None of those figures include the flight to get here.
Our advice is to decide what matters most and spend there, then economize on the rest. And whatever the total comes to, add fifteen percent for tax and tip, because it will be there at the till whether you planned for it or not.