Canada's 2026 Study Permit Cap, PAL & PGWP Rules Explained

On November 25, 2025, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) published the provincial and territorial allocations for its 2026 international student cap — the same cap first signalled in the 2026-2028 Immigration Levels Plan, now broken down with specific numbers. Alongside the cap, IRCC introduced a new exemption from the Provincial or Territorial Attestation Letter (PAL/TAL) requirement for master's and doctoral students, and in January 2026 confirmed that the Post-Graduation Work Permit (PGWP) eligible field-of-study list would not change for the year. For a consultancy running Canada study-permit cases, these are the specific, dated rules that sit underneath the headline levels-plan targets.

The 2026 study permit cap: 408,000 total

IRCC's notice sets a 2026 target of up to 408,000 study permits — 155,000 new permits for students arriving for the first time, and 253,000 extensions for students already in Canada continuing or changing programs. That total is roughly 7% below the 437,000 target set for 2025, and about 16% below the 485,000 target for 2024. The 155,000 new-permit figure lines up with the number already cited in our Immigration Levels Plan explainer — this notice is where that headline number gets its provincial breakdown.

Who needs a PAL/TAL in 2026 — and who's newly exempt

Of the 408,000-permit total, IRCC reserves 49,000 spots for master's and doctoral students at public designated learning institutions — who, as of January 1, 2026, no longer need a Provincial or Territorial Attestation Letter at all. This is a new carve-out that did not exist in 2025. A further 115,000 spots are reserved for K-12 students and 64,000 for other specifically exempt categories, none of which require a PAL/TAL either. The remaining 180,000 spots are allocated by province and territory and do require one, tied to the province or territory where the applicant's institution is located — the same general mechanism described in our PAL/TAL explainer, now with the 2026 numbers attached.

Provincial PAL/TAL allocations for 2026

IRCC's notice splits the 180,000 PAL/TAL-required spots across every province and territory, based on population and recent approval-rate history. Ontario and Quebec together account for more than 60% of the national total:

Separately, IRCC plans to process 309,670 applications nationally in this PAL/TAL-required category — a larger number than the 180,000 planned issuances, since it accounts for applications that will ultimately be refused. These are IRCC's published planning figures as of the November 2025 notice; always confirm the current numbers directly on IRCC's website, since provincial allocations have been adjusted mid-cycle in past years.

PGWP eligible fields of study: frozen for 2026

Separately from the study permit cap, IRCC confirmed on January 15, 2026 that the list of fields of study eligible for a Post-Graduation Work Permit would not change for the year — no additions, no removals. The list currently stands at 1,107 eligible programs (identified by CIP code), up from an earlier 920. In June 2025, IRCC had flagged 178 fields of study as candidates for removal; that removal was paused in July 2025, and the 2026 freeze keeps all of those programs eligible for now. This freeze applies to diploma/certificate-level field-of-study eligibility specifically — bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degree holders remain exempt from the field-of-study test regardless, as covered in our PGWP eligibility explainer.

IRCC has described this as a freeze for 2026, not a permanent policy — the list has changed more than once before. A specific program's PGWP eligibility should be confirmed against IRCC's current published list at the time of enrolment, not assumed to carry over unchanged into future intakes.

What this means for Indian students and consultancies

Three practical takeaways follow from these numbers. First, the new master's/PhD PAL exemption removes a documentation step for students headed into graduate programs at public institutions — worth flagging to those clients specifically, since it wasn't the rule in 2025. Second, PAL/TAL allocation is now heavily concentrated in Ontario and Quebec, which affects how approval-volume expectations should be set for students placed in other provinces with much smaller allocations. Third, the frozen PGWP field-of-study list gives a stable reference point for 2026 enrolment decisions, but it should still be checked program-by-program and re-verified again for any future intake.

Our Canada study permit software page covers how VisaBOS helps a consultancy track each student's PAL/TAL status, exemption category, and PGWP field-of-study eligibility alongside the rest of the study-permit checklist on one case record — though it is a case-management tool, not a source of immigration policy, and does not replace verifying current IRCC figures directly.

Frequently asked questions

Disclaimer: this article is provided for general informational purposes only and is not immigration advice. Study permit caps, PAL/TAL allocations, and PGWP eligibility rules are set by IRCC and can be revised; always confirm the current, official figures directly on IRCC's website before relying on them for a specific case or business decision.