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Kitchen Renovation Cost Calculator Canada — Per Linear Foot, Per Province, After Tax
Canadian kitchen cabinetry is quoted by the linear foot and priced by what the boxes are made of. Build your budget from the two numbers you can actually measure, then see what your province does to it.
Educational calculators — always consult a licensed professional before making financial decisions.
Your kitchen
The province sets the sales tax on the whole contract. Toronto and Vancouver add ×1.25 to installed work only — appliances are never uplifted.
Sets the sales tax on the contract — on a C$40,000 kitchen the spread is over C$5,000.
HST 13% on the whole contract, labour included.
Applied to installed work only — never to appliances.
×1.25 on installed work. Permit computed from the City's 2026 schedule.
Measure the run along the wall at counter height, uppers and lowers counted once. Refacing is a whole-kitchen price, so the run is not asked.
Canadian cabinetry is priced by carcass material, per linear foot.
The common Canadian mid-range choice.
Measure along the wall, at counter height. A typical Canadian kitchen is 20–25 feet.
Measure the counter surface, not the floor: a 25-inch-deep run is about 2.1 sq ft per linear foot. Add the island separately.
Priced per square foot, installed, in CAD.
The Canadian default. No sealing, consistent pattern.
A typical Canadian kitchen runs 30–40 sq ft, including the island.
Each is a published whole-kitchen band. Floor area feeds only the City of Toronto permit fee, not the renovation cost.
No regional adjustment applies — appliances cost the same everywhere in Canada.
Moving it is the kitchen equivalent of moving a toilet.
C$1,500–4,500 to work to the existing rough-in.
Select all that apply. Each is a published whole-kitchen band, not a per-foot rate.
Used only for the City of Toronto permit calculation.
Kitchen renovation · Ontario · Toronto / GTA
C$41,227 – C$86,586
Out the door, including 13% sales tax · all figures in Canadian dollars (CAD)
What sales tax does to this kitchen in Ontario
HST 13% applies to the whole contract — labour and materials alike. There is no separate provincial line and no exemption for labour.
Tax follows the province the house is in — not where you live, and not where your contractor is based. The same contract in Alberta would carry C$1,824 – C$3,831 instead of Ontario's C$4,743 – C$9,961.
Every line, itemised — all CAD, before tax
Estimated — Canadian market band
C$450–600 per linear foot. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour. Canadian cabinetry is quoted by the linear foot and priced by carcass material — melamine, polyester, thermofoil, solid wood — which is not the same ladder as the American stock / semi-custom / custom convention.
Estimated — Canadian market band
C$110–180 per square foot installed. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour.
Estimated — Canadian market band
No regional adjustment is applied to appliances — a refrigerator costs the same in Calgary as in Toronto. The labour multiplier belongs on labour.
Estimated — Canadian market band
Published as a whole-kitchen band of C$1,500–6,000. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour.
Estimated — Canadian market band
C$800–2,500. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour.
Estimated — Canadian market band
C$800–3,000. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour. Under-cabinet and pot lights are where this band spends itself.
Estimated — Canadian market band
C$500–2,000. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour.
Derived — see note
The source states installation labour as 20–25% of TOTAL project cost. Because every line above is a materials figure, the multiplier on materials is 0.2500–0.3333, not 0.20–0.25 — applying 20–25% to materials directly is the obvious mistake and understates the trades by thousands. Plumbing is excluded from this base because it is already trade labour.
Estimated — Canadian market band
C$1,500–4,500 where the drain and supply stay where they are. ×1.25 for Toronto / GTA labour.
Government schedule · shown, not added
City of Toronto minimum permit fee. At 120 sq ft with 2 plumbing fixtures the computed charge does not reach the C$214.79 floor, so the fee is flat. The crossover for a two-fixture kitchen sits at about 135 sq ft. Shown for transparency but NOT added to the total: the source's own budget allocation already sets aside 5% for permits and contingency inside the component bands above.
Sanity check. A full Canadian kitchen renovation averages C$35,000 – C$45,000 nationally, before tax. Your build-up straddles that band, which is what a correctly-specified kitchen of this size should do.
All figures in Canadian dollars (CAD). Sales tax treatment for every province and territory is quoted from a government source read 7 September 2026 — the Canada Revenue Agency for GST and HST rates, the Province of British Columbia and Manitoba Finance for the provincial taxes their contractors pay rather than charge, and Saskatchewan Information Bulletin PST-12 for the one province that taxes renovation labour outright. Quebec's QST rate is the single exception and is flagged above. Toronto permit fees come from the City's published 2026 schedule. Cabinetry, countertop, appliance, plumbing and labour bands are Canadian market figures from Reno Quotes' 2026 kitchen price guide, updated 4 September 2026. No US cost data is used anywhere in this model. Nothing is collected or stored — the calculator runs in your browser and there is no form.
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Canadian cabinetry is not priced the American way
American kitchen guides sort cabinets into stock, semi-custom and custom. Canadian cabinetmakers quote by the linear foot and price by carcass material — melamine, polyester, thermofoil, solid wood. Those are different ladders, and converting a US figure into Canadian dollars produces a number no Canadian quote will ever reconcile to. Cabinets are 30–40% of a typical kitchen budget, so getting this axis right matters more than anything else on the page.
| Carcass material | Per linear ft (CAD) | 22 linear ft (CAD) | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Melamine | C$250–400 | C$5,500 – C$8,800 | Entry point. Durable enough, limited door styles. |
| Polyester | C$450–600 | C$9,900 – C$13,200 | The common Canadian mid-range choice. |
| Thermofoil | C$500–750 | C$11,000 – C$16,500 | Seamless finish; heat near ovens is its weakness. |
| Solid wood, custom | C$850+ | C$18,700 – C$26,400 | Open-ended in the source; we cap at C$1,200. |
| Refacing existing boxes | Whole kitchen | C$6,000 – C$15,000 | Not multiplied by your cabinet run. |
All figures in Canadian dollars, national bands before any regional adjustment. A typical Canadian kitchen is 20–25 linear feet. Rates read 7 September 2026.
What the build-up looks like on a real kitchen
22 linear feet of polyester cabinetry in Toronto, 35 sq ft of quartz, a mid-range appliance package, new flooring, backsplash, lighting and sink, with the plumbing staying where it is:
| Line | Low (CAD) | High (CAD) | Basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cabinetry — 22 linear ft, polyester | C$12,375.00 | C$16,500.00 | C$450–600/linear ft × 1.25 |
| Countertop — 35 sq ft, quartz | C$4,812.50 | C$7,875.00 | C$110–180/sq ft × 1.25 |
| Appliances — mid-range package | C$6,000.00 | C$12,000.00 | No regional adjustment |
| Flooring | C$1,875.00 | C$7,500.00 | C$1,500–6,000 × 1.25 |
| Backsplash and tiling | C$1,000.00 | C$3,125.00 | C$800–2,500 × 1.25 |
| Lighting | C$1,000.00 | C$3,750.00 | C$800–3,000 × 1.25 |
| Sink and faucet | C$625.00 | C$2,500.00 | C$500–2,000 × 1.25 |
| Materials and supply | C$27,687.50 | C$53,250.00 | Sum of the seven lines above |
| Installation labour | C$6,921.88 | C$17,750.00 | Derived: ×0.2500 low, ÷3 high |
| Plumbing — existing rough-in | C$1,875.00 | C$5,625.00 | C$1,500–4,500 × 1.25 |
| Ontario HST at 13% | C$4,742.97 | C$9,961.25 | On the whole contract, labour included |
| Out the door | C$41,227.35 | C$86,586.25 | Contract plus Ontario HST |
All figures in Canadian dollars. The pre-tax contract of C$36,484.38–C$76,625.00 straddles the source's own Toronto/GTA band of C$40,000–75,000, which is what a correctly-specified 22-foot kitchen should do.
The labour line, and the mistake almost everyone makes
The source states installation labour as 20–25% of total project cost. That is not 20–25% of your materials. If labour is 20% of the total, materials are the other 80%, so the multiplier on a materials subtotal is 0.20 ÷ 0.80 = 0.2500; at the top of the range it is 0.25 ÷ 0.75 = 0.3333. Applying 20–25% to materials directly — the obvious shortcut — understates the trades by roughly C$1,500 to C$2,500 on a C$30,000 materials subtotal. Plumbing sits outside this calculation entirely, because it is already trade labour and multiplying it would charge you for the plumber twice.
British Columbia versus Saskatchewan: the C$206.75 that looks like C$1,841.25
Take the same kitchen outside the two premium markets — a pre-tax contract of C$30,687.50, of which C$23,350.00 is materials. Saskatchewan charges GST 5% plus PST 6% on the whole thing, labour included, as a separate line on your invoice: C$3,375.63. British Columbia charges GST 5% and nothing else: C$1,534.38. That looks like a C$1,841.25 saving.
It is not. British Columbia does not charge PST on services to real property, but it does charge your contractor 7% PST on every material bought for the job — and a kitchen is materials-heavy, roughly 76% of the contract here. That is another C$1,634.50 inside the quoted price. BC's true tax burden is C$3,168.88 against Saskatchewan's C$3,375.63: a real difference of C$206.75. A calculator that shows only the visible rate overstates British Columbia's advantage roughly ninefold.
Why this matters more for a kitchen than for anything else
The buried tax scales with the materials share of your contract, and a kitchen is the most materials-heavy room in the house — cabinetry, stone, appliances and flooring are all goods. A bathroom runs roughly 40% materials; this kitchen runs 76%. So in British Columbia and Manitoba the gap between the tax on your invoice and the tax you actually pay is wider on a kitchen than on almost any other renovation you will ever commission.
How certain each number is
- ✓Government source — every sales tax rate and rule, and the City of Toronto permit. Read at the Canada Revenue Agency, the Province of British Columbia, Manitoba Finance, the Government of Saskatchewan and the City of Toronto on 7 September 2026, with one exception named below.
- ·Estimated market band — every component: cabinetry, countertops, appliances, flooring, backsplash, lighting, sink and plumbing. All from one Canadian price guide updated 4 September 2026, three days before it was read, which makes it the freshest cost source on any Canadian renovation page on this site.
- ·Derived — the labour line only, with the arithmetic shown above and cross-checked against the source's own worked C$40,000 example.
- ·Not modelled — building permits outside Toronto, because every municipality prices them differently and only the City of Toronto's schedule could be read at source; and any labour discount for Montréal or smaller centres, because the source shows those markets below the national average but states no discount percentage. Your estimate for those cities leans slightly high, deliberately.
- !One rate we could not confirm at source — Quebec's QST. Revenu Québec's published rate pages returned HTTP 403 on 7 September 2026, so the 9.975% figure is carried from this site's own Canadian tax module rather than quoted at the ministry. It is flagged in the results whenever Quebec is selected.
Two ceilings on this page are ours rather than the source's: custom solid wood is published as “C$850+” per linear foot and the premium appliance package as “C$15,000 and up”, neither with an upper bound. They are closed at C$1,200 and C$30,000 so the arithmetic has a number, and the calculator says so on screen whenever either is selected. No US cost data appears anywhere in this model.
Doing the bathroom at the same time?
A bathroom is priced differently — by scope rather than by quantity, because the published Canadian evidence for bathrooms comes as tier totals rather than a component breakdown. It runs the same province-by-province tax engine as this page, and it models the two drivers a kitchen does not have: relocating fixtures within a waterproofed wet area, and the damage found behind the tile.
Related Canadian calculators
Pricing the rest of the house, and paying for it
A kitchen at this scale is usually drawn against home equity rather than paid in cash.
Methodology
This is a component build-up rather than a tier band, because the Canadian source behind it publishes cabinetry per linear foot and countertops per square foot — real quantities you can measure. Our bathroom calculator is deliberately shaped the other way, because its source publishes tier totals and only four components; a bottom-up bathroom model assembled from four published components and judgment would look more precise and be less true. The two pages differ in shape because the Canadian evidence differs, not for variety.
The regional labour adjustment of ×1.25 for Toronto and Vancouver is the bottom of the 25–40% premium the source publishes, and it is the same multiplier used by our basement calculator. It is applied to installed work and deliberately not to appliances, which cost the same everywhere in Canada. Where a province's provincial sales tax on materials is borne by the contractor rather than charged to you — British Columbia, and Manitoba on everything except appliances — it is computed against the materials subtotal, which this model knows exactly rather than assuming, and shown as a disclosure rather than added to your total. Manitoba is the exception: Bulletin 008 lists appliances as tangible personal property, so Manitoba's 7% RST on the appliance line is charged to you and added to your total, not buried in the quote — read at Manitoba Finance on 28 September 2026. Three hand-worked examples in Canadian dollars, each with its province named and including the Toronto minimum-permit-fee boundary at 135.16 sq ft, are written out in the header of src/lib/calculators/ca/kitchen-renovation.ts and pinned in tests/calculators/ca-kitchen-renovation.test.ts.
All figures are in Canadian dollars and labelled C$ throughout, including the tables and the structured data. Nothing is collected or stored — the calculator runs in your browser and there is no form. This is a budgeting tool, not a quote; get three written quotes before you sign anything.
Sources
- Canada Revenue Agency — GST/HST rates and place-of-supply rules (Ontario 13%, Nova Scotia 14% from 1 April 2025, New Brunswick / Newfoundland and Labrador / PEI 15%, all other provinces and territories GST 5%) — checked 2026-09-07
- Province of British Columbia — Charging and collecting PST for contractors: services to real property are not subject to PST, and the contractor pays PST on goods that become part of real property — checked 2026-09-07
- Manitoba Finance — Retail Sales Tax Bulletin No. 005, Information for Contractors (RST 7%; contractors pay RST on materials installed into real property and do not charge RST on their billings). Issued June 1996, revised July 2019 — checked 2026-09-25
- Government of Saskatchewan — Information Bulletin PST-12, Services to Real Property (PST 6% collected on the total charge to the customer including labour, materials and permits, shown as a separate line item). Issued February 1985, revised July 2024 — checked 2026-09-07
- City of Toronto — Building Permit Fees (2026 schedule: C$13.41/m² residential alterations, C$23.20 per plumbing fixture in a single family dwelling, C$214.79 minimum fee for all work). Effective 1 January 2026, page modified 19 June 2026 — checked 2026-09-07
- Reno Quotes (Soumission Rénovation) — Kitchen Renovation Cost in Canada: 2026 Price Guide (cabinetry per linear foot by material, countertops per square foot by material, appliance packages, flooring, backsplash, lighting, sink and faucet, plumbing with and without relocation, labour as a percentage of project cost, and the regional premium for Toronto and Vancouver; article updated 4 September 2026) — checked 2026-09-07
Quebec's QST rate is the one figure on this page with no primary source link above: Revenu Québec returned HTTP 403 to every attempt to read its published rate pages on 7 September 2026, and the rate is carried from this site's own Canadian tax module instead. It is flagged in the results whenever Quebec is selected.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a kitchen renovation cost in Canada in 2026?
A full Canadian kitchen renovation averages C$35,000–45,000 before tax, with a basic refresh at C$15,000–25,000 and a high-end kitchen at C$65,000 and up. Toronto and Vancouver run roughly 25% above the national figures. A 22 linear foot polyester kitchen in Toronto with 35 sq ft of quartz, a mid-range appliance package, new flooring, backsplash, lighting and sink comes to about C$36,484–C$76,625 before tax, or C$41,227.35–C$86,586.25 once Ontario's 13% HST is added.
How much do kitchen cabinets cost per linear foot in Canada?
Canadian cabinetry is quoted by the linear foot and priced by carcass material: melamine C$250–400, polyester C$450–600, thermofoil C$500–750, and custom solid wood C$850 and up per linear foot. A typical Canadian kitchen is 20–25 linear feet, so a melamine kitchen runs about C$5,000–10,000 and a custom solid wood one about C$17,000–21,000. Refacing the existing boxes instead — new doors and drawer fronts on sound carcasses — is C$6,000–15,000 for the whole kitchen and is usually the largest single saving available.
Do you pay HST or GST on a kitchen renovation in Canada?
It depends on the province the house is in, because a renovation is a service in relation to real property and the tax follows the property rather than your address. Ontario charges 13% HST on the whole contract including labour; Nova Scotia 14% since 1 April 2025; New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador and Prince Edward Island 15%. Alberta and the three territories charge GST 5% only. Saskatchewan charges GST 5% plus PST 6% and is the only non-HST province that taxes renovation labour outright. Quebec charges GST 5% plus QST 9.975%.
Is a kitchen renovation really cheaper in British Columbia than in Saskatchewan?
Far less than the invoices suggest. On an identical C$30,687.50 kitchen contract, Saskatchewan adds 11% visible tax, or C$3,375.63. British Columbia adds only GST 5%, or C$1,534.38 — an apparent saving of C$1,841.25. But BC's 7% PST is charged to your contractor on the materials, which are C$23,350 of that contract, adding about C$1,634.50 to the price you pay without appearing on any invoice. The true difference is about C$206.75, not C$1,841.25. A calculator that shows only the visible rate overstates British Columbia's advantage roughly ninefold.
How much of a kitchen renovation budget is labour in Canada?
Installation labour is about 20–25% of total project cost, which is not the same as 20–25% of your materials. Because materials make up the other 75–80%, the labour multiplier applied to a materials subtotal is 0.25 to 0.333. On C$27,687.50 of materials that is C$6,921.88 at the low end. Applying 20–25% to materials directly is the common mistake and understates the trades by thousands. Plumbing is quoted separately as its own trade and sits outside that calculation.
How much does it cost to move the sink in a kitchen renovation?
Working to the existing rough-in costs about C$1,500–4,500. Moving the sink to a new location — most often to an island — costs about C$2,500–5,500 instead, because the drain and supply have to be re-run, which in a Canadian house often means opening the floor or the ceiling below. It is the decision that most reliably turns a predictable kitchen into an unpredictable one, and no per-square-foot estimate contains it.
Do I need a building permit for a kitchen renovation in Toronto?
The City of Toronto's 2026 schedule charges C$13.41 per square metre for residential alterations plus C$23.20 per plumbing fixture in a single family dwelling, subject to a C$214.79 minimum for all work. A 120 sq ft kitchen with two fixtures computes to C$195.90, under the floor, so the fee is C$214.79. The crossover for a two-fixture kitchen is about 135 sq ft — a 135 sq ft kitchen still pays the minimum, and a 136 sq ft one pays C$215.83. Outside Toronto this calculator shows no permit figure at all rather than guessing at another municipality's schedule.
Want to try different numbers?
Back to the calculator ↑Kitchen Renovation Cost Calculator Canada is built and maintained by the RealCostIQ editorial team. Cost ranges and rates are checked against published industry data and contractor quotes, and revised when the underlying figures move. Read our data methodology or more about who builds this. Every calculation runs in your browser — no account, and none of your inputs are stored.
Cost ranges and rates here are checked against contractor quotes and published industry data. If a number still looks off, email Support@RealCostIQ.com and we'll review and fix it.