Where this program actually stands
Newfoundland and Labrador has become, in practice, a route for people who are already working in the province. Its published criteria still describe candidates abroad, and almost everything the province has changed since early 2025 has narrowed the program towards people who are already here.
Three quarters of the nominations are reserved before the criteria are read
The province states that the changes it made in March 2025 were required when the federal government cut provincial immigration capacity and implemented a new requirement that 75 per cent of provincial nominees for permanent residency must be existing temporary residents in Newfoundland and Labrador.
We report that in the province's words because of what we could not confirm. The condition is not in the published Canada and Newfoundland and Labrador immigration agreement, and we found no published federal instruction setting it out. We could not find the instrument at all. The program audit mentions the annual federal allocation letter, which is not published. The only official statement of it is dated March 2025 and refers to that year's allocation, and we found no confirmation that it continues in 2026.
One further caution, because the difference matters to you. The province says temporary residents in Newfoundland and Labrador. The federal levels plan speaks of applicants already in Canada as temporary residents. We could not find a document reconciling the two, so we do not tell you the narrower reading is a federal rule.
There is no direct application to any category
Since 19 February 2025 every economic immigration route the province administers runs through one expression of interest pool, the nominee program and the Atlantic Immigration Program together. You register an expression of interest, and you may then be invited to apply. Nothing is submitted directly, and no documents are filed at the expression of interest stage.
An expression of interest without a job offer identified in it will not be considered for an invitation. An employer invite code is also needed by anyone who requires a job vacancy assessment space, and by every Atlantic Immigration Program applicant, without which the expression of interest is invalid and is not reviewed. Only someone who already holds authorisation to work for that employer in that position is exempt, so being inside Canada does not by itself remove the requirement.
- The pool is not scored. The province publishes nine prioritization criteria and states that they guide decisions without guaranteeing an invitation. An independent audit of the program by BDO Canada LLP, published 26 January 2026, found the system functions primarily as an intake filter rather than a comprehensive ranking mechanism. There is no cut off to aim at, and no published score.
- One category does have a grid. Express Entry Skilled Worker requires 67 points of a possible 100 on the Annex A point assessment grid. It is a condition of nomination, not a ranking. It does not apply to the other categories, and the current Skilled Worker criteria page does not mention it.
- Invitations stopped for sixteen weeks. No round was issued between 12 November 2025 and 6 March 2026. The province published no explanation and we do not offer one.
- Moving from another province carries its own test. Twelve consecutive months of full time employment in the province before nomination, in force since 16 July 2025, proven by pay slips.
The three worker categories, and who each is really for
| Express Entry Skilled Worker | Skilled Worker | International Graduate | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Occupation level | TEER 0, 1, 2 or 3 | TEER 0 to 5, so it reaches occupations the federal programs exclude | TEER 0 to 3, or a TEER 4 occupation the province treats as in demand |
| Federal Express Entry profile | Required. You must be accepted into the federal pool and hold a valid profile | Not required | Not required |
| Post graduation work permit | Permitted. A permit holder can use this category | Not permitted. A permit holder must use one of the other two | Required, with at least four months validity left when you apply |
| Points grid | Yes. 67 of 100 on the Annex A grid, as a condition of nomination | None published | None published |
| Education | A Canadian post secondary credential or a valid educational credential assessment | None stated | The credential you completed, with the job normally related to your field of study |
| Language | A valid test, with the minimum set by the federal program you qualify under rather than by the province | Only where the job is at TEER 4 or 5, at CLB 4 in each of the four abilities, tested within two years | Only where the job is at TEER 4 and in demand, at CLB 4 in each ability |
| What the employer needs | A job vacancy assessment or a labour market impact assessment, unless you already hold authorisation to work full time in that position | A job vacancy assessment, unless you already hold a work permit for that position | Nothing separate stated beyond the job offer meeting the common requirements |
Every category also carries the common requirements set out below. The province describes all three as open, and none of them can be applied to directly.
The discretion to demand a language test is not limited to the levels that require one. On the Skilled Worker category the province states that its officers may require a test at any occupation level, including TEER 0 to 3, based on written and verbal correspondence with you. Refusing is escalated, and failing to meet the minimum results in refusal. So the absence of a language requirement on paper is not a guarantee that no test will be asked for.
- Every category asks the same of the job offer. Full time, guaranteeing a minimum of thirty hours a week, at least one year in duration with a reasonable expectation of extension as verified by the employer, from an eligible provincial employer, paid as a salary or an hourly wage rather than commission, meeting provincial employment standards and regional prevailing wage rates.
- Age is an eligibility range, not a scoring factor. Twenty one to fifty nine on the current criteria pages. A candidate of sixty is outside the category rather than scoring low, which is different from how age works in the federal system.
- Ten per cent is the ownership ceiling. An ownership stake in the employing business cannot exceed ten per cent, which does not apply to the entrepreneur categories.
- Settlement funds are tested without a published figure. The province publishes a qualitative test rather than a dollar amount. Funds must have been genuinely held in your accounts for at least three months, be readily available, and not be borrowed in any way. Property equity is expressly rejected as not liquid. We confirm the expectation against the live source for each file rather than printing a number the province has not published.
- A refugee claim in Canada is a bar. The province states that an open work permit issued to a claimant does not give the required temporary status, and that a person whose claim was rejected, abandoned or withdrawn must leave Canada before applying.
- Three further bars apply across every category, and one of them is easy to overlook. A criminal record, an unresolved custody or child support dispute in Canada or another country, and misrepresentation by you or by your employer. The child support bar in particular has nothing to do with your occupation or your employer and defeats an otherwise strong file.
- Police certificates are required from more places than people expect. From everywhere you have lived for more than six months since the age of eighteen, or over the last ten years, whichever is more recent. On the International Graduate category a criminal record of any dependent family member over the age of twenty two also counts against the file.
How selection works, and the clocks that lose files
- You register, you wait, and there is no progress to report. The expression of interest captures identification, education, occupation and intention to reside. No documents are filed. Between submission and an invitation the province states there is no update it can provide.
- An expression of interest lasts twelve months. Then it expires and a new one must be submitted.
- An invitation lasts sixty days, and the province does not extend it. A complete application must be submitted inside that window or the invitation is marked expired. An invitation is not an approval, and the province states that a file may still be closed or refused at any point after it.
- The ninety day expiry belongs to your employer, not to you. A job vacancy assessment not submitted within ninety days of being started expires. Your own clock after an invitation is sixty days, and the province publishes no separate ninety day rule for an applicant.
- A nomination certificate lasts six months, and an extension is discretionary rather than yours for the asking. The province grants one only where the federal government returned your permanent residence application through no fault of yours, where it asks for an extension as a condition of a work permit, or in other extenuating circumstances, and it refuses one where the nominee simply did not apply in time. On the Express Entry category an extension creates a fresh nomination, which counts twice against the province's allocation, and you must either resubmit the federal application or build a new federal profile.
- If you are laid off after nomination, the operative policies give you four weeks. The nomination is placed on hold for four weeks while you find a new qualifying job offer. The candidate guidance says approximately four to six weeks, and we plan against the four in the policies rather than the more generous reading, because this window decides whether a nomination survives.
| Round | Total invitations | Nominee program | Atlantic Immigration Program |
|---|---|---|---|
| 18 August 2026 | 122 | 122 | None |
| 10 August 2026 | 208 | 186 | 22 |
| 28 July 2026 | 445 | 400 | 45 |
| 10 July 2026 | 57 | 17 | 40 |
| 10 June 2026 | 108 | 89 | 19 |
| 28 May 2026 | 103 | 84 | 19 |
| 11 May 2026 | 186 | 168 | 18 |
| 1 May 2026 | 190 | 157 | 33 |
| 13 April 2026 | 210 | 177 | 33 |
| 30 March 2026 | 245 | 209 | 36 |
| 6 March 2026 | 445 | 362 | 83 |
| 13 November 2025 to 5 March 2026 | No rounds issued | None | None |
Across 2025 the province issued 3,376 invitations, being 2,473 under the nominee program and 903 under the Atlantic Immigration Program. To 18 August 2026 it has issued 2,319, being 1,971 and 348. The province splits its published figures between the two programs only, so there is no breakdown by category, no occupation breakdown and no score attached to any round.
More invitations are issued than there are nomination spaces. The province issued 2,473 nominee program invitations in 2025 against an allocation of 2,050. Reading an invitation as a place in the program is a mistake, and it is a further reason not to treat an invitation as an outcome.
What the province says it prioritises
Last updated 23 March 2026. The province had already named selection factors in April 2025, so this is a fuller statement rather than the first one. It describes the list as neither exhaustive nor fixed, and says it may be adjusted during the year.
- Health and health related occupations. Described as a strong priority.
- Sales and service roles that support rural labour needs. With an express qualification that expressions of interest connected to the St. John's metropolitan area may receive lower priority for these occupations when program usage is already high. So the same occupation is treated differently depending on where the job is.
- Jobs in rural and regional areas. Consistently, across the criteria and the entrepreneur categories.
- Occupations underrepresented in the province. Named as business and finance, science and research, and trades and transport.
- Employers with a strong record on compliance and retention. The employer is assessed as well as you.
- Likelihood of staying. Long term retention in the province, and community ties.
- Graduates of the province's own institutions. Which is the same direction of travel as the temporary resident condition.
- Francophone immigration objectives. A separate policy on assessing French speaking candidates, last updated 28 April 2026, says they should generally demonstrate the equivalent of CLB 5 in French in all four competencies. It is guidance rather than a fixed floor, and the province warns that an unproven French claim can lead to a file being closed or to a misrepresentation finding.
- Strong settlement and integration supports. Assessed as part of the picture rather than as a separate test.
You cannot switch between the two programs once approved
Once nominated under the nominee program, or endorsed under the Atlantic Immigration Program, moving to the other is not permitted except on a material change outside your control, which the province illustrates with a permanent business closure or a refusal of permanent residence. An approved exemption cancels the earlier approval and sends you back to a fresh expression of interest, invitation and application.
Advice given before March 2026 that you can pivot between the two is no longer correct.
Where the province's own pages disagree
Reported rather than resolved, because both are current official pages.
Two official pages describing the same requirement differently is a finding in itself, and picking one silently would be the wrong service. Where it matters to a file we confirm the position with the province rather than relying on either page.
| Question | What one page says | What the other says |
|---|---|---|
| How long must the job offer run | The applicant criteria pages require at least one year, being twelve months, with a reasonable expectation of extension as verified by the employer | The employer criteria page requires the offer to be full time and at least two years |
| Can an employer be allocated positions in advance | The province announced on 7 March 2025 that employers would no longer be granted pre approval for a specific number of spaces | The job vacancy assessment guidance still states that a positive assessment allocates a certain number of positions the employer can fill |
| Is there a provincial fee for the entrepreneur category | The International Entrepreneur overview page states there is no fee to apply under the category, and the province abolished both its $250 worker fee and its $1,000 entrepreneur fee in April 2022 | One guide hosted on the site still describes a provincial application fee and points readers to the website for a schedule that does not exist. Another hosted version of the same guide says there is no fee, so we read the fee wording as a document left behind rather than a position the province holds |
The pattern to watch for here is a superseded document rather than a genuine dispute. The province eliminated its application fees in April 2022 and its current policy manual pages say there is no provincial application fee, so where an older hosted guide still describes one we treat it as out of date rather than as a competing position.
What we could not source, stated rather than left silent
Each of these is something a reader might reasonably expect to find here. We looked for it in the category pages, the policy manuals, the applicant guides and their appendices, and the province's own audit, and could not confirm it. An absence we state is knowledge. An absence we leave silent reads later as an oversight.
- The 2026 allocation. The province published a 2025 figure of 2,050 for the nominee program and 475 for the Atlantic Immigration Program, against 2,100 for the nominee program in 2024. It has published no 2026 figure. Nationally the provincial nominee target rose to 91,500 for 2026, and the province's share of it is not published.
- Whether the 75 per cent condition still applies this year. The only official statement is dated 7 March 2025 and describes the 2025 allocation.
- The instrument that imposes it. Not in the published federal and provincial immigration agreement, and no published federal instruction sets it out. The province's audit points to the annual allocation letter, which is not published.
- How many nominations have actually been issued. The province publishes invitation counts and never nomination counts. Its audit confirms it reports nominations to the federal government every two weeks, and none of that reporting is public.
- The list of TEER 4 occupations the province treats as in demand. Its own policy exempting home support workers confirms such a list exists, and we could not find it published. The separate list of positions exempt from labour market testing is a different instrument and we do not present it as this one.
- A dollar figure for settlement funds. The test is qualitative in every category.
- Whether the twenty five day service standard has been reinstated. Suspended 31 January 2025, with no announcement since, and the candidate guidance states there are no standard processing times.
- Whether Priority Skills NL was formally closed, and when. Absent from every current list, with an empty page, and no closure announcement we could find.
- Why invitations stopped for sixteen weeks over the winter. No explanation was published and we will not speculate about allocation exhaustion or administration.
One more caution about the grid. The Annex A grid is the live eligibility test for the Express Entry Skilled Worker category, linked from a criteria policy the province dates to April 2025. It also still scores occupations as NOC O, A and B rather than by TEER, and refers to a provincial department that no longer exists. We use it because the province requires it, and we read it alongside the current criteria pages rather than as though it had been rewritten.
The conditions every category shares
These apply across all three worker categories, so they are worth testing before you work out which one fits your record. It returns an indication only, not an eligibility decision, not legal advice, and not a prediction that you will be invited.
Your situation
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