By and large, Canada’s cruise industry remained on an even keel in 2025 with arrivals totalling 1.9 million.
Cruise arrivals first recovered from pandemic lows in 2023 and continued to surge in 2024, surpassing pre-pandemic highs of 1.5 million arrivals by 33.4% that year. Heightened traveller volumes in the April and October shoulder months added more wind to the industry’s sails.
Through the Frontier Counts data program, cruise data are collected at travellers’ first port of call in Canada.
Victoria is Canada’s premier cruise port of entry
British Columbia, the country’s main gateway for cruise passengers, accounted for 81.1% or 1.5 million cruise ship arrivals in 2025.
Victoria was Canada’s busiest cruise port of entry with 959,100 arrivals, followed by Vancouver (533,300). Cruise ships arriving at these ports typically depart from Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles, with Alaska as the ultimate destination.
One in five cruise passengers disembark on the East Coast
East Coast ports accounted for one-fifth (18.2%) of cruise arrivals in 2025.
Halifax/Dartmouth (149,900 arrivals) and Saint John (135,300) anchored the East Coast cruising industry. Cruise ships arriving at these ports typically depart from New York and Boston in the fall, allowing passengers to admire the changing autumn colours.
Cruise ships warming to Arctic ports
Warming ocean temperatures are bringing more ships into northern waters, including cruise ships. Ports such as Inuvik/Tuktoyaktuk, Pond Inlet and Iqaluit welcomed 5,600 arrivals in 2025, up by over one-quarter (+27.0%) since 2019, with cruise arrivals peaking in August.
In 2020, almost half (49.8%) of the Arctic Cordillera ecozone, an area which includes Iqaluit and Pond Inlet, was covered by snow or ice year-round. This value will be closely examined over the coming years given the changing climate.
Four in five cruise arrivals are from the United States
US residents accounted for four in five cruise arrivals (80.0%) in 2025. The leading ports of entry for US residents were Victoria (844,900 arrivals), Vancouver (346,700) and Halifax/Dartmouth (121,400).
The recovery in cruise arrivals at Canadian ports since the onset of the pandemic is mostly attributable to US-resident arrivals, which reached 143.9% of 2019 levels in 2025.
For overseas residents (from countries other than the United States), Vancouver edged out Victoria by a slight margin as the most popular port of arrival, with 89,300 arrivals compared with Victoria’s 82,600. The third most popular entry point for overseas residents was Halifax/Dartmouth (20,600).
Overseas arrivals outnumber Canadian arrivals
Overseas residents accounted for 11.9% (227,800) of total cruise arrivals in 2025, leaving cruise arrivals by Canadians (8.1%) in their wake.
Over 1 in 10 (11.1%) overseas arrivals in 2025 came directly from overseas, triple the share that did so in 2023 (3.7%). Since 2024, top ports of entry for overseas residents coming directly from overseas were Sydney, Halifax/Dartmouth and St. John’s.
For overseas residents travelling to Canada via the United States, the top ports of choice were Vancouver (89,100), Victoria (82,600) and Halifax/Dartmouth (11,500), with this group totalling 202,500 arrivals in 2025.
Looking ahead
To learn more about Frontier Counts data, check out the next “Travel between Canada and other countries” release in The Daily on March 23, 2026.
Contact information
For more information, contact the Statistical Information Service (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).