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High-Wage and Low-Wage LMIA Waits Hold Near Two-Plus Months as Low-Wage Stream Slips to 61 Days

Canadian employers using the two most common Labour Market Impact Assessment (LMIA) streams face waits of about two to three months, according to processing-time figures Employment and Social Development Canada (ESDC) published on June 9, 2026. The numbers cover May 2026 and are measured against the previous month, April.

The high-wage stream held at 64 business days, unchanged from April. The low-wage stream rose to 61 business days, up three days. These two streams matter most to general employers because together they cover the bulk of ordinary hires that do not fall under specialized routes such as the Global Talent Stream or the agricultural programs.

An LMIA is a document from ESDC that most employers need before they can hire a temporary foreign worker. A positive assessment confirms there is a genuine need for the worker and that no Canadian citizen or permanent resident is available to do the job. The worker then uses the positive LMIA to apply for a work permit.

The split between the high-wage and low-wage streams turns on a single threshold: the wage the employer is offering for the position, compared with the median hourly wage for that province or territory. When the offered wage is at or above the applicable provincial or territorial median, the application generally goes through the high-wage stream. When it falls below that median, it is handled under the low-wage stream. The two streams carry different requirements and, as the latest figures show, different processing experiences.

For now, those experiences are converging. The high-wage stream stayed flat while the low-wage stream ticked up, narrowing the gap between them to three business days. Both sit comfortably above the two-month mark, putting them among the longer waits in ESDC's current table, behind only the Permanent Residence stream, which dropped sharply to 114 business days but remains the slowest route overall.

Employers planning around these timelines should note an important caveat in how ESDC reports them. The published processing time begins once a complete application is in the department's hands. It does not include the time needed to meet the minimum advertising and recruitment requirement, which ranges from 14 days to eight weeks depending on the stream and must be completed in the three months before the LMIA is submitted. A realistic end-to-end timeline therefore runs noticeably longer than the headline figure.

ESDC notes that how long any individual file takes depends on the stream, whether the application is complete when filed, and the volume of applications the department is handling at the time. With high-wage waits steady and low-wage waits edging up, employers in both streams should budget for a multi-month process and build the recruitment window in before the clock on the published number even starts.

A small portion of this article — research support, fact-cross-checking, and copy-editing — was assisted by AI tooling. Editorial decisions, source verification, and final sign-off remain with our team. We cite primary sources from canada.ca for every factual claim.

Last reviewed: June 26, 2026

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