Labour market experiences of recent immigrants, 2019 to 2025
Released: 2026-04-07
Two studies released today provide new insights on the labour market integration of immigrants and non-permanent residents (NPR) who have arrived in Canada in recent years.
Immigrants who arrived in the five years preceding the third quarter of 2024 generally fared better than previous cohorts in the labour market
The study "Labour market experiences of recent working-age immigrants and non-permanent residents, 2019 to 2024" uses data from the quarterly supplement to the Labour Force Survey (LFS) to examine the initial experiences of working-age immigrants and NPRs, that is, those aged 25 to 54 who were at least 20 years old when they arrived and who arrived in Canada in the five years preceding the third quarter of 2024. This was a period characterized by tight labour market conditions and a rapid increase in the number of immigrants and NPRs.
Overall, the study found that working-age immigrants who had arrived in Canada during this period generally fared better than previous cohorts with regards to several aspects of their initial integration into the labour market.
For instance, 42.5% of recent working-age immigrants who were not employed at the time of their arrival had found a job or started a business in Canada less than three months after arriving. This was higher than the corresponding proportion (31.3%) for working-age immigrants who had arrived from 10 to less than 15 years earlier.
Chart 1
Compared with previous cohorts, recent working-age immigrants who had not secured a job before arriving were more likely to have found one in less than three months
At the same time, over 3 in 10 (31.7%) recent working-age immigrants reported experiencing difficulties finding their first job. Among those who experienced difficulties, not having enough job experience or references in Canada (42.2%), having no connections in the job market (38.3%) and job experience from outside Canada not being accepted (34.6%) were the most commonly reported obstacles.
Job mismatch remains more prevalent among recent immigrants
The article "Job mismatch among core working age immigrants with postsecondary education," based on monthly supplements to the LFS collected in September 2024 and September 2025, shows that core-aged (25 to 54 years old) recent immigrants with a postsecondary certificate, diploma or degree remained more likely than established immigrants and persons born in Canada to experience various forms of job mismatch. On average, in September 2024 and September 2025, close to one-third (32.6%) of core-aged recent immigrants with postsecondary qualifications reported being overqualified for their job, compared with almost 1 in 5 (19.1%) persons born in Canada. Further, recent immigrants with postsecondary credentials were more likely to be in a job that was not related to their field of study (20.8%) compared with persons born in Canada with postsecondary credentials (15.6%).
Chart 2
Types of job mismatch among core-aged workers with a postsecondary diploma or degree, by immigrant status
For a given level of work experience, recent core-aged immigrants were more likely than persons born in Canada to report having more skills than needed for their job. For example, 22.5% of recent immigrants with postsecondary qualifications and less than five years of experience reported having more skills than needed for their job, compared with 14.2% of their Canadian-born counterparts.
Note to readers
The article "Labour market experiences of recent working-age immigrants and non-permanent residents, 2019 to 2024" is now available. The study uses data from the quarterly supplement to the Labour Force Survey (LFS) for the third quarter of 2024 and examines key aspects of the labour market integration of recent immigrants and non-permanent residents (NPRs), focusing on indicators not otherwise available from other sources.
Recent working-age immigrants are defined as landed immigrants who arrived in Canada less than five years previously, who were at least 20 years old when they arrived and who were aged 25 to 54 at the time of the survey. The year of arrival is used instead of the year of admission in order to more explicitly reflect the labour market integration of newcomers in relation to actual time spent in Canada.
For more information on the data source see the page Labour Market and Socioeconomic Indicators.
The article "Job mismatch among core working age immigrants with postsecondary education" is also available and analyzes various measures of job mismatch for recent immigrants aged 25 to 54 using data from the monthly supplement to the LFS for September 2024 and September 2025. Estimates reflect the average of the two periods.
In this study, recent immigrants are defined based on the year of admission. The concept of recent immigrant refers to those who were admitted as permanent residents to Canada in the previous five years.
For more information on the data source see the page Labour Market Indicators.
Both studies focus on results that are significant at the 95% confidence level.
Products
The articles "Labour market experiences of recent working-age immigrants and non-permanent residents, 2019 to 2024" and "Job mismatch among core working age immigrants with postsecondary education" are now available online in the Labour Statistics at a Glance series (71-222-X).
Contact information
For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).
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