Why Canada Is Reducing Study Permits For International Students?

Canada has put an additional cap on the intake of international students willing to study there, as per the information revealed by Canada’s Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). The announcement came amid the country’s management of temporary resident arrivals.

As per the IRCC announcement, a reduction of 10% in study permits from the 2024 target of 485,000 has been decided for the session 2025. It plans to stabilize the intake cap for 2026 so the number of study permits remains the same as in 2025, which is reducing study permits issued to 437,000.

Earlier, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada announced a reduction in temporary residents – from 6.5% of Canada’s total population to 5% by 2026. The federal government is taking this decision to manage the increase of temporary residents and hold employers misusing the system accountable. To achieve the target, the immigration department is taking measures including reforming the International Student Program, enforcing strict employer compliance, tightening eligibility requirements for temporary foreign workers, and making the labor market impact assessments more rigorous to mitigate fraud and others.

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To align with the country’s immigration goals and labour market needs, IRCC will also update the Post-Graduation Work Permit Program. Canadian government also planning to limit work permit eligibility, to spouses of master’s degree students for only those whose program is at least 16 months in duration. It will also make additional limitiation under Canada’s work permit programmes (TFWP and IMP) for work permit eligibility to spouses of foreign workers in management sector or in sectors with labour shoratages.

Also, the 2025-26 study permit restrictions covers master’s and doctoral students who will now have to submit a provincial or territorial attestation later.

As per the Ministry of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship, the decision to curb student intake is taken to strengthen country’s temporary residence programs and roll out a more comprehensive immigration plan to meet the changing landscape.