Canada student grants and loans, in plain English
If you are planning post-secondary study in Canada and money is tight, the federal government may help in two different ways: grants you do not repay, and loans you do repay after you leave school. Both come through the Canada Student Financial Assistance Program, usually shortened to the CSFA Program. You apply once, through your province or territory, and that one application is assessed for federal and provincial help together. This site explains the federal side of that system: who it is for, how much help is available, what you sign, and what happens when repayment begins.
The short version
Apply through your province or territory. If you have at least one dollar of assessed financial need, you are assessed for grants first, and loans cover remaining need up to the federal limits. Grants are not repaid as long as you stay eligible. Federal student loans have carried no interest since April 1, 2023. When repayment starts, a six-month non-repayment period comes first, and the Repayment Assistance Plan can reduce payments to zero if your income is low enough.
The program is needs-based, which is a polite way of saying it measures the gap between what your studies cost and what you and your family are assessed as able to contribute. For full-time students, assessed need is allowable study and living costs minus assessed resources. For part-time students, the calculation is narrower: it looks at allowable educational costs only, not living expenses. That difference matters a lot, and it is why full-time and part-time students get different kinds of help, as explained on the full-time versus part-time page.
Two cautions belong at the front of any honest guide. First, the federal program does not operate in Quebec, Nunavut, or the Northwest Territories, which run their own student aid programs and receive alternative payments from the federal government instead. If you live in one of those three jurisdictions, this site's federal figures do not describe your program. Second, every dollar figure on this site is tied to a school year. Amounts are set in regulation for each loan year, which runs from August 1 to July 31, and they can change. The figures quoted here are the 2025-2026 figures, and where Canada.ca confirms the same maxima continuing into 2026-2027, the page says so. Never budget from a figure without checking which year it belongs to.
What this site covers
| Item | What it means | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Full-time vs part-time | How need is assessed differently, and why part-time help is capped differently | Your course load changes the whole calculation |
| Grants | The main Canada Student Grants, with 2025-2026 maxima by category | Grants reduce what you need to borrow |
| Loan limits | The federal weekly limit and the part-time outstanding cap | Loans fill the gap grants leave |
| The MSFAA | The one agreement that covers your federal loans | No signed MSFAA, no money |
| Repayment help | The Repayment Assistance Plan and its income thresholds | Low income can mean a zero payment |
| Interest | Why the federal portion is interest-free since April 1, 2023 | Provincial portions may still charge interest |
| Provincial integration | One integrated loan versus two separate loans | Repayment looks different depending on your province |
| Repayment and default | The six-month non-repayment period, default, and rehabilitation | Acting early protects your options |
| Apprenticeship and disability | Canada Apprentice Loans and disability-related grants | Different routes, same federal system |
A final point of framing: this is a federal explainer, not a provincial one. Your province or territory decides which schools and programs are designated, runs the application and the need assessment, and adds its own grants and loans on top of the federal ones. The federal figures here are therefore only part of your total package. Your Notice of Assessment from your province or territory is the document that tells you your real total, and it is the number to plan around.
Sources: Government of Canada, Canada.ca student financial aid pages; Canada Gazette Part II, SOR/2025-113 (Regulations Amending the Canada Student Financial Assistance Regulations, for loan year 2025-2026); Employment and Social Development Canada, CSFA Program annual reports.