Program leaders and instructors in recreation, sport and fitness salary in Canada
$37,544CAD/YR
Program leaders and instructors in recreation, sport and fitness in Canada earn a median of $37,544 a year, about $19.00 an hour.
SOURCE·Employment and Social Development Canada — Job Bank wage data·Open Government Licence – Canada·REVIEWED 2025
What $37,544 is actually worth
Move this wage out of Canada and it converts to $26,618. Spend it where it was earned and it buys what $29,785 buys in the United States. Those are two answers to two different questions, and the distance between them is the thing worth reading — here it is a factor of 1.12.
At the exchange rate At local prices The disagreement
The hollow marker is the exchange-rate reading: what the money is worth if it leaves. The solid marker is the purchasing-power reading: what it is worth if it stays. The hatched span between them is the disagreement, and it is what every single-country salary site leaves out.
SOURCE·European Central Bank reference rates (via Frankfurter) and World Bank PPP conversion factor PA.NUS.PRVT.PP·FX 2026-07-29·REVIEWED PPP 2025
How Canada arrived at this figure, and what it is not
- Employment and Social Development Canada publishes Job Bank wage data for the reference period 2025. We take the occupation row as released and change nothing in it.
- 2021 Census wage distributions by NOC and economic region
- Where the agency publishes a distribution we carry the whole distribution, because a single average throws away the part of the answer people are actually asking about.
- The wage is then read twice: converted at the European Central Bank reference rate for 2026-07-29, and divided by the World Bank purchasing-power conversion factor for CAN. Both readings are printed; neither is presented as the answer.
- Countries measure pay differently. A tax return, an employer payroll survey, a PAYE sample and a household survey are four different instruments, and gaps of a few per cent between countries are the instruments, not the wages.
converted = CAD 37,544 / FX(CAD->USD) adjusted = CAD 37,544 / PPP(CAN) disagreement = adjusted / converted
Where it pays more in Canada
Median pay for this occupation by area, highest-employing first.
| Area | Median | vs national |
|---|---|---|
| Yukon Territory | $54,024 | +44% |
| Kootenay | $51,277 | +37% |
| Northeast | $50,961 | +36% |
| Northwest Territories | $50,368 | +34% |
| North Coast | $49,519 | +32% |
| Lower Mainland | $48,412 | +29% |
| British Columbia | $46,910 | +25% |
| Vancouver Island and Coast | $46,910 | +25% |
| Thompson--Okanagan | $46,910 | +25% |
| Cariboo | $45,823 | +22% |
| Nunavut | $45,448 | +21% |
| Banff--Jasper--Rocky Mountain House | $41,615 | +11% |
| Côte-Nord | $41,595 | +11% |
| Red Deer | $41,377 | +10% |
| Wood Buffalo--Cold Lake | $41,219 | +10% |
| Camrose--Drumheller | $40,923 | +9% |
| Lanaudière | $40,883 | +9% |
| Edmonton | $40,508 | +8% |
| Muskoka--Kawarthas | $39,955 | +6% |
| Stratford--Bruce Peninsula | $39,619 | +6% |
| Chaudière-Appalaches | $39,520 | +5% |
| Laval | $39,520 | +5% |
| Abitibi-Témiscamingue | $39,520 | +5% |
| Kingston--Pembroke | $39,520 | +5% |
| Northwest | $39,520 | +5% |
Regional figures come from the same release as the national one. Where an area is missing, the source suppressed it for sample-size reasons rather than reporting an unreliable estimate.
Every figure this page rests on
| Reading | CAD | What it is |
|---|---|---|
| Median | $37,544 | The middle earner |
| Mean | $42,899 | Pulled up by top earners |
| 25th percentile | $33,098 | — |
| 75th percentile | $47,424 | — |
| Hourly | $19.00 | Median at 38 hrs/week |
Employment and Social Development Canada · 2025
SOURCE·Employment and Social Development Canada — Job Bank wage data·Open Government Licence – Canada·REVIEWED 2025
What people ask next
- How much do program leaders and instructors in recreation, sport and fitness earn in Canada?
- The median is $37,544 a year, about $19.00 an hour, according to Employment and Social Development Canada, Job Bank wage data 2025.
- Is that figure before or after tax?
- Before. Every figure on this page is gross pay as the statistics agency published it — income tax, social contributions and any deductions come off afterwards, and they differ enough between countries that we do not model them.
- Why is the US-dollar figure different depending on where I read it?
- Because there are two of them. $37,544 converts to $26,618 at the exchange rate on 2026-07-29, and buys what $29,785 buys in the United States once Canada's price level is accounted for. The first answers "what could I wire abroad", the second answers "how well does someone live on this".
