Express Entry

Express Entry is not an immigration programme. It is the online system the Government of Canada uses to manage applications for three of its permanent residence programmes: the Federal Skilled Worker Program, the Canadian Experience Class and the Federal Skilled Trades Program. You do not apply to Express Entry — you apply through it.

How it works

There are two steps, and they are often confused with each other.

First, you create a profile. You enter your age, education, work history, language test results and a few other details. If you are eligible for at least one of the three programmes, your profile joins a pool of candidates and is given a score out of 1,200 under the Comprehensive Ranking System — the CRS. Your profile stays in the pool for up to twelve months.

Then Canada invites from the pool. Every few weeks IRCC holds a round of invitations and invites the highest-ranked candidates. If you are invited, you receive an Invitation to Apply and have sixty days to submit a full permanent residence application with your documents. Applications that are complete are processed with a service standard of around six months.

It is a ranking, not a queue

This is the part worth understanding before anything else. Waiting longer does not move you up. A candidate who creates a profile next month with a higher score will be invited ahead of one who has been in the pool since last year. If your score sits below the cut-off, time on its own will not fix it — improving a language test result, finishing a credential, or gaining another year of skilled experience will.

Not every round is a general round

Some rounds invite the highest-ranked candidates regardless of their background. Others are limited to one programme, or to a category — healthcare and social services, skilled trades, education, agriculture, or candidates with strong French. A category round usually has a far lower cut-off score than a general one, which is why a score that looks out of reach in one round can be enough in another. The table further down this page shows which rounds have been held recently and where each one cut off.

Where Skylam comes in

Most of the work in an Express Entry application happens before the profile is created: choosing which programme to claim, deciding how to describe a job so the duties match the occupation claimed, getting an educational credential assessed, and sitting the right language test at the right time. Mistakes made at that stage are what applications are refused for later, and they are difficult to unwind once a profile is live.