Canada Tariff Schedule,
read and applied live.

Legal structure of the Customs Tariff

Canada builds on the same World Customs Organization 6-digit international HS base as every other jurisdiction, then extends it to an 8-digit tariff item for legal classification, with a further 2-digit statistical suffix bringing the full working code to 10 digits. The Canada Border Services Agency administers and enforces the schedule at the port of entry, while the Canadian International Trade Tribunal hears classification, valuation, and origin appeals, and rules on safeguard and trade remedy injury questions. Classification itself is governed by the same six General Rules of Interpretation used internationally, applied against Canada's own chapter and heading notes.

Chapters 1 through 97 cover substantive goods. Two further chapters sit outside that logic, in a structure that closely mirrors other HS-based schedules:

• Chapter 98 holds special classification provisions such as conveyances and containers, commercial samples, and goods for repair, alteration, or further processing, which can reduce or eliminate duty regardless of the Chapters 1 through 97 classification.
• Chapter 99 provides permanent, product-specific duty relief, most heavily used for imported inputs to Canadian food, beverage, and manufacturing production. Unlike some other jurisdictions, Canada does not use Chapter 99 to layer trade remedy or retaliatory duties on top of a base classification; those are instead imposed through separate Orders in Council that reference the underlying HS classification directly, though CBSA guidance confirms goods classified under Chapters 98 or 99 are not automatically exempt from a surtax and must be checked against the relevant order.

Where the US schedule carries three rate columns, Canada's carries substantially more. Each tariff line lists the Most-Favoured-Nation rate alongside a General Tariff rate (the non-normal-trade-relations rate, which applies to North Korea and, following Canada's 2022 revocation of their MFN status, to Russia and Belarus), plus a distinct preferential rate for every free trade partner and nonreciprocal program Canada maintains: the United States and Mexico Tariffs under CUSMA, the CPTPP partner tariffs, the CETA-linked EU tariff, a further dozen bilateral tariff treatments, and the General Preferential Tariff and Least Developed Country Tariff for developing-country trade. A given 8-digit line can carry well over a dozen distinct rates simultaneously, and the correct one depends on a documented, verifiable claim of origin, not simply the country of export.

One further structural point matters for cost modelling: unlike the United States, Canada layers federal sales tax on top of duty at the border. GST, or the applicable HST rate in participating provinces, applies to the duty-paid value of most imported goods, in addition to any customs duty, surtax, or SIMA duty owing on the same entry.

Trade agreements and preferential tariff treatments

The general MFN rate applies by default. A preferential rate is available only where the good qualifies under a specific program's rules of origin and the importer holds the supporting documentation to substantiate the claim on request.

The Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement is the largest such program by trade volume, and its origin rules mirror the equivalent USMCA provisions on the US side: a regional value content threshold, a tariff classification shift, or, for passenger vehicles and light trucks, a labour value content requirement. The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership extends preferential access across eleven Pacific Rim members, and the Canada-EU Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement covers the European Union on a provisionally applied basis pending full ratification by all EU member states. A further set of bilateral agreements, each with its own rules of origin, covers Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Honduras, Israel, Jordan, South Korea, Panama, Peru, Ukraine, and, on a transitional basis pending a successor agreement, the United Kingdom.

The General Preferential Tariff and Least Developed Country Tariff operate differently, extending nonreciprocal preferential access to developing and least-developed economies respectively, subject to periodic review and country graduation as economies develop. Eligibility under either program can change from one annual tariff update to the next, so a rate that applied last year should not be assumed current without checking the applicable country list.

Retaliatory surtaxes and countermeasures

Separate from the base schedule, Canada holds a standing executive authority under subsections 53(2) and 79 of the Customs Tariff that lets the Governor in Council impose a surtax on goods from a specific country in response to that country's trade-restricting acts or policies. Unlike the US Section 301 process, this power does not require a preceding USTR-style unfair-trade investigation; it is exercised directly by Order in Council and can be amended or repealed on short notice, which has made it the central mechanism in Canada's response to US tariff actions since 2025.

Following the United States' imposition of tariffs on Canadian goods in February 2025, Canada imposed a 25 percent surtax on a broad list of US-origin goods worth roughly $30 billion CAD annually, with a further list held in reserve. In August 2025, the government announced it would align its countermeasures to mirror actual US tariff exposure rather than maintain broad retaliation, and effective September 1, 2025, repealed the surtax on the large majority of US goods, including most consumer products, apparel, and agrifoods. Surtaxes on US-origin steel, aluminum, and motor vehicles remain in force, because the US Section 232 tariffs on those categories carry no CUSMA carve-out. A series of remission orders, including the United States Surtax Remission Order and a separate motor vehicle remission framework, allow importers to seek relief where the surtaxed input is not reasonably available from a Canadian or other source.

Alongside the US-facing surtaxes, Canada has separately tightened its steel import regime to address global overcapacity and diversion. Effective December 26, 2025, tariff rate quotas on steel mill products from countries without a Canadian free trade agreement were cut from 50 to 20 percent of 2024 import volumes, and quotas for FTA partners were cut from 100 to 75 percent, with a 50 percent surtax applying to any volume above the quota in both cases. A further 25 percent surtax applies specifically to steel derivative products such as doors, windows, wire, fasteners, bridges, and wind towers from any country, and a separate 25 percent surtax targets goods containing steel melted and poured in China, regardless of which country the goods are shipped from, carving out the United States. A Federal Buy Canada procurement policy, effective for new competitive procurements above $10,000, further restricts suppliers from non-reciprocal trading partners from bidding on covered federal contracts.

Trade remedy duties under the Special Import Measures Act

Canada's antidumping and countervailing duty regime runs on a split-agency model much like the US, though the two Canadian agencies divide the work differently. The CBSA investigates and calculates dumping margins and subsidy amounts, issuing normal values, export prices, and provisional duty rates during an investigation. The Canadian International Trade Tribunal makes the corresponding injury determination and can also impose global safeguard measures following its own investigation into a surge of imports causing serious injury to a domestic industry.

Once a finding is in place, duties are collected at entry through CARM, the CBSA's Assessment and Revenue Management system, at the currently disclosed normal value, export price, or subsidy amount for the specific exporter and country involved. As under the US regime, these orders are producer-specific: two shipments of an identical tariff item from different exporters in the same country can carry substantially different duty rates. Findings and orders are subject to a mandatory expiry review roughly every five years, and the CBSA and CITT can also conduct anti-circumvention and scope proceedings where goods are re-routed, lightly altered, or re-described to avoid an existing order. The volume of active SIMA proceedings has risen sharply as global steel, aluminum, and other overcapacity has been diverted toward the Canadian market by tariff actions elsewhere, and CBSA has correspondingly expanded dedicated enforcement capacity, including a steel-specific compliance team and a public tip portal for suspected circumvention.

De minimis and low-value shipment thresholds

Canada's de minimis treatment is narrower and more origin-specific than the general US approach. The baseline threshold for courier shipments from any country other than the United States or Mexico remains $20 CAD, below which duties and taxes are remitted. Under a CUSMA-specific commitment that applies only to courier shipments (not postal) originating in the United States or Mexico, that threshold rises to $40 CAD for full relief from duties and taxes, and to $150 CAD for relief from duties alone, with applicable GST, HST, and provincial sales tax still collected between $40.01 and $150. Separately, the Courier Low Value Shipment threshold, currently $3,300 CAD and applied consistently regardless of origin or mode, allows qualifying commercial shipments simplified release, accounting, and documentation treatment rather than full formal entry.

Because the CUSMA de minimis commitment is tied to the courier channel and to US or Mexican origin of shipment rather than country of manufacture, a shipment of third-country goods routed through a US fulfillment centre can qualify for the higher threshold, while an identical shipment sent by post, or shipped directly from a non-CUSMA country, cannot. Getting this distinction wrong is a common source of unexpected duty and tax assessments for e-commerce importers.

Principal compliance challenges

The Enthron approach

A determination starts with the product itself: a description, spec sheet, or existing code submitted through the API or app, with Enthron asking for whatever attributes are missing before it commits to a classification. From there, it classifies against the full Canadian schedule, Chapters 1 through 99, and resolves the applicable tariff treatment against a documented origin claim rather than country of shipment alone. Enthron then checks the classification against every active overlay: retaliatory surtaxes and their remission orders, steel tariff rate quotas and melt-and-pour rules, SIMA findings matched to producer and country, and safeguard measures in force. Every determination returns with the 10-digit code, the applicable tariff treatment, a confidence score, the GRI logic applied, and the specific measures stacked on top, giving a compliance team a defensible record the moment a duty is questioned, not just a number.

Because Canada's countermeasure and steel regimes change by Order in Council on their own timeline, Enthron treats that overlay as something to monitor continuously rather than configure once. When a surtax list is amended, a remission order is expanded, or a SIMA administrative review resets a normal value, classifications already on file are flagged against the change automatically, rather than surfacing months later at an audit or a CARM reassessment.