The trade occupations category: the full list of 25 trades

The trade occupations category covers construction and the skilled trades, plus the management roles that run them. Experience may have been gained in Canada or abroad.

For how category rounds work in general, see how Express Entry invitations are issued. One thing to separate out before the list: this category is not the same thing as the Federal Skilled Trades Program. The program is one of the three routes into the Express Entry pool. The category is a filter IRCC applies to people already in the pool when it runs a category-based round. A candidate can be in the pool through the Canadian Experience Class and still be eligible for the trades category, and a candidate can qualify for the Federal Skilled Trades Program in an occupation that is not on this category list.

The occupations in this category

Things worth noticing

Construction managers (70010) and home building and renovation managers (70011) are TEER 0 roles on the list. The category is not restricted to people on the tools.

Butchers — retail and wholesale (63201) is on it. Like insurance brokers in the STEM category, this looks like a mistake and is not.

Which row applies to you is a question about duties, not job title — see how to find your NOC code.

“Other technical trades and related occupations” (72999) is a real row. Catch-all NOC codes are legitimate classifications, and if your duties genuinely fall there, that is the code.

Contractors and supervisors, oil and gas drilling and services (82021) extends the category into resource work, which people searching for a “construction” category often miss.

What the category actually asks for

Category eligibility is separate from program eligibility, and both have to be satisfied.

To be considered in a round for this category, IRCC looks for at least 12 months of full-time work experience — or the part-time equivalent — accumulated within the past three years, in a single occupation from the list above.

Three details in that sentence do a lot of work:

• It does not have to be continuous. Twelve months assembled from separate stretches within the three-year window counts.
• It has to be one occupation. Six months in one listed occupation plus six months in another does not add up to twelve.
• It does not have to be your main job. IRCC’s wording is explicit that the experience counts “no matter your primary occupation.” Someone whose current role sits outside the list may still be eligible on the strength of earlier experience inside it.

Certification is a separate question

Being in this category says nothing about whether you can legally practise the trade in a given province. Trade certification is provincial, and the requirements differ. A candidate can be eligible for a category-based round and still need to go through a provincial certification process after arriving — those are two different systems, and neither one substitutes for the other.

What being in a category does not mean

This is the part most worth being clear about, because it is where the disappointment usually happens.

Being eligible for a category does not mean an invitation follows. It means that if IRCC runs a round for that category, you are among the candidates who can be considered in it. Candidates are still ranked, and rounds still invite from the top down.

It also does not put you in the pool. You enter the Express Entry pool only by qualifying for one of the three programs underneath it — the Federal Skilled Worker Program, the Canadian Experience Class, or the Federal Skilled Trades Program. A category is a filter applied to people already in the pool, not a route into it.

ZIMMR does not publish target scores or predict which categories will be drawn. Anyone who tells you what score you “need” for a category is guessing.

Before you rely on this

IRCC sets these categories and revises them. The list above was checked against IRCC’s published criteria on the date at the top of this article, but the authoritative version is always the one on canada.ca on the day you apply. Check it there before making a decision.