Alberta population keeps growing, while Canada's dips in Q3: StatsCan

Alberta’s population bucked the trend that almost every other Canadian province and territory experienced last quarter, Statistics Canada population estimates suggest.

The country’s population declined by more than 76,000 people in the third quarter of 2025, data shows, marking the first quarterly dip since the fourth quarter of 2020, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic.

But Alberta continued growing last quarter, its population rising by about 11,500 people, data shows.

“This has been the story of Alberta for quite a while now, where we have seen so much more population growth than the rest of Canada,” said Alicia Planincic, director of policy and economics for the Business Council of Alberta, a business advocacy organization.

“We're definitely seeing those numbers slow, but now it's kind of unique in that we're the only province that's actually growing.”

Alberta has experienced record growth in recent years, driven mainly by migrants from other countries and other Canadian provinces. But the current situation comes amid federal efforts to reduce the number of non-permanent residents — foreign nationals granted temporary stay, such as work permit holders and asylum seekers — allowed into the country, and lower the cap on international student admissions.

The Alberta government backs “any policies that scale back and focus on economic migration, fulfilling legitimate labour shortages rather than oversaturating the market with entry-level workers,” Hunter Baril, spokesperson for Jobs, Economy, Trade and Immigration Minister Joseph Schow, told CBC News in an emailed statement.

He blamed federal immigration policies for contributing to pressure on public services and the housing and job markets, and said the provincial government plans to use “all legal measures” to gain more control of immigration. He noted that immigration is a responsibility shared between federal and provincial and territorial governments.

Statistics Canada, in a report released Wednesday, attributed the country’s population drop to fewer non-permanent residents — and Alberta wasn’t immune to that.

Canada as a whole lost almost 176,500 non-permanent residents, including about 10,600 who were living in Alberta.

Alberta accepted hundreds of more asylum claimants, data shows. But it reported about 11,800 fewer work permit holders, and lost more than 4,100 study permit holders.

“We will see a smaller number of students coming to Alberta, but it still remains attractive,” said Nancy Thornton, director of NorQuest International, which focuses on international students for Edmonton’s NorQuest College. “Students are very discerning where they're going to go.

“They're not just saying, ‘Hey, what program can I get into?’ They're saying, ‘Where can I settle? Where can I make a living? Where am I going to get a great job and the opportunity to stay and contribute to the province, to the country.’”

Nunavut was the only other jurisdiction that recorded growth, adding 89 people last quarter, data shows.