Express Entry 2023–2026: Complete Category History, What Changed & What Was Retired

Canada’s Express Entry category-based selection system has changed significantly each year since its introduction. What started in May 2023 as six broad categories has evolved through multiple iterations into a sophisticated, nuanced framework that reflects Canada’s annual economic priorities in unprecedented detail.

For anyone trying to navigate Express Entry — whether as a candidate, an employer, or an immigration professional — understanding this evolution is not just an academic exercise. The pattern of changes from year to year reveals how IRCC thinks about labour markets, which sectors Canada is most committed to supporting, and where new categories might emerge in future years. This blog traces the complete history.

The Beginning: May 2023 — Category-Based Selection Launches

Category-based selection was introduced by then-Immigration Minister Sean Fraser on May 31, 2023. It launched with six occupational and language categories:

• French language proficiency — targeting Francophone candidates globally
• Healthcare occupations — targeting physicians, nurses, and allied health professionals
• STEM occupations — targeting engineers, scientists, and technology professionals
• Trades occupations — targeting certified tradespeople
• Transport occupations — targeting truck drivers, transit workers, and other transport roles
• Agriculture and agri-food occupations — targeting farm workers, food processors, and related roles

The minimum work experience requirement at launch was six months in an eligible occupation within the previous three years. The first category draws were held in June 2023 and produced CRS cut-offs significantly below what general draws had required, immediately demonstrating the system’s potential for candidates in priority occupations.

The introduction of category-based selection was widely praised by immigration practitioners and welcomed by industry associations in the targeted sectors. Critics noted that the categories were relatively broad and that the specific NOC codes included within each category sometimes captured occupations that did not closely align with Canada’s most acute shortages.

2024: Refinement and the Shift Away from General Draws

The six original categories were maintained throughout 2024 without major structural changes, but the broader Express Entry landscape shifted significantly. IRCC progressively reduced and then effectively eliminated all-program (general) draws, replacing them with a combination of category draws, CEC draws, and PNP draws.

The most significant structural shift came in April 2024: from April 23, 2024 onward, all non-category, non-PNP draws were conducted exclusively under the Canadian Experience Class. This meant that candidates without Canadian work experience and without a category-eligible occupation had no realistic pathway through Express Entry for general draws. The system had effectively become bifurcated: candidates with Canadian experience went into CEC draws, while those in priority occupations competed in category draws.

IRCC’s 2024 consultation on Express Entry economic priorities (held in late 2024) began asking questions that foreshadowed the 2025 and 2026 changes — including questions about raising the work experience threshold, adding categories for senior managers and researchers, and focusing more on candidates already in Canada.

February 2025: The First Major Category Overhaul

On February 27, 2025, IRCC conducted the first comprehensive overhaul of the category-based selection framework. The changes were extensive:

• The transport occupations category from 2023 was retired. This category had targeted ground transport workers including truck drivers and urban transit operators. IRCC’s analysis indicated that the acute labour shortages in this segment had eased sufficiently that a dedicated category was no longer warranted.
• A new education occupations category was introduced. This targeted teachers and education professionals — a sector experiencing significant shortages particularly at the K-12 level in many provinces.
• The eligible occupation lists within several categories were significantly updated, adding and removing specific NOC codes to better reflect current labour market conditions. Several categories were updated to “Version 2” to reflect these NOC list changes.

The minimum work experience requirement remained at six months in 2025, but IRCC’s consultation materials were already signaling consideration of a future increase.

December 2025: The Physicians Category Added

On December 8, 2025, IRCC introduced the physicians with Canadian work experience category — the first category added outside of the annual cycle. This was an emergency-style policy response to the ongoing and worsening physician shortage, combined with a broader package of measures targeting healthcare supply.

The December 2025 announcement confirmed that this category would hold its first draw in early 2026. The regulatory clarification regarding fee-for-service work arrangements was also part of this announcement. By year-end 2025, the category framework had grown to seven categories, with another significant overhaul imminent in 2026.

February 18, 2026: The Comprehensive 2026 Update

The most recent and most comprehensive update came on February 18, 2026, when Minister Diab announced the full 2026 Express Entry category framework.

• What was retired: Agriculture and agri-food occupations was the only category retired for 2026. Cooks were also removed from the trades category eligible occupation list — a specific occupational exclusion rather than a full category retirement.
• What was renewed (continuing from 2025): French language proficiency, healthcare and social services, STEM occupations, trade occupations (without cooks), and education occupations. The physicians with Canadian work experience category, added in December 2025, also continued and held its first draw on February 19, 2026.
• What was new for 2026: Researchers with Canadian work experience, senior managers with Canadian work experience, transport occupations (new aviation-focused version, entirely different from the 2023 transport category), and skilled military recruits for the Canadian Armed Forces.
• Universal change applying to all renewed categories: The minimum work experience threshold was raised from six months to 12 months within the previous three years.

The Pattern: What Year-Over-Year Changes Tell Us

Stepping back and looking at the 2023-2026 progression reveals a clear and consistent pattern in how Canada is using category-based selection:

• First, Canada is moving upmarket. The occupations being added are increasingly high-skilled, high-credential, and high-specialization. Senior managers, researchers, military professionals, and physicians are the most elite professional categories Canada has ever targeted through category-based immigration. The retirement of agriculture and the removal of cooks from trades continues this direction.
• Second, Canada is increasingly prioritizing domestic retention over international recruitment. The “Canadian work experience” requirement in three of the four new 2026 categories signals that the government sees retaining already-present talent as the priority — not simply casting a wider global net. This reflects both efficiency concerns (people already here are faster to integrate) and strategic concerns (temporary workers who leave Canada represent wasted infrastructure investment).
• Third, Canada is using immigration as a precise policy instrument. Each category launch or retirement corresponds to a documented labour market need or a specific government policy agenda. The military category ties directly to the Defence Industrial Strategy. The physician category ties to the healthcare shortage crisis. The researcher category ties to the Budget 2025 innovation agenda. This level of alignment between immigration policy and broader government priorities is more deliberate than at any previous point in Canada’s immigration history.
• Fourth, the minimum qualification bar is rising. The increase from six to 12 months of work experience is part of a broader trend toward ensuring that category draw recipients are high-quality matches for Canadian labour market needs.

What This Predicts for 2027 and Beyond

Based on the 2023-2026 progression, we can make some informed predictions about where category-based selection is likely to go next:

• The military recruits category is likely to expand. If it proves effective in its inaugural year, the scope of eligible roles within the CAF will almost certainly broaden. Additional defence industrial occupations — engineers working in defence contracting, intelligence professionals, cybersecurity specialists working with defence-adjacent organizations — may become eligible.
• New AI and technology-specific categories are a plausible future direction. As Canada invests more in artificial intelligence through institutions like the Vector Institute, Mila, and the CIFAR AI Chairs program, dedicated immigration streams for AI researchers and practitioners may emerge — potentially distinct from the broader STEM and researcher categories.
• The work experience threshold may continue to rise. The jump from 6 to 12 months may not be the final word. A future increase to 18 or 24 months is conceivable if IRCC continues to see value in filtering for candidates with more established Canadian careers.
• The “Canadian experience” requirement may become even more prevalent. The three new 2026 categories that require Canadian experience reflect a deliberate policy choice. Future categories may increasingly carry this requirement, further emphasizing retention over recruitment.