A citizen or a permanent resident can sponsor certain close relatives for permanent residence. The sponsor signs an undertaking: a promise to support the person for a set number of years. The promise survives divorce, separation, and a move. If the sponsored person later needs social assistance, the sponsor can be asked to repay it.
Who can be sponsored
- A spouse, common-law partner, or conjugal partner.
- A dependent child.
- Parents and grandparents, when a round is open.
- In rare cases, one other relative, or an orphaned close relative under 18.
A cousin, a niece who has parents, or an adult sibling of someone who already has a spouse is not on that list because the family wants them here.
What the sponsor has to be
- 18 or older, a citizen or a permanent resident.
- Not barred by a broken undertaking, a sponsorship default, certain criminal convictions, or undischarged bankruptcy.
- Not receiving social assistance for a reason other than disability.
- A permanent-resident sponsor must be living in Canada. A citizen living abroad can sponsor a spouse or child only if they will live in Canada when that person arrives.
- If the person will live in Quebec, the sponsor also signs a Quebec undertaking after the federal assessment. Two governments, two promises, one file.
Sponsorship is not a visit and it is not a work permit. Some spouses already in Canada can ask for an open work permit while the sponsorship is processed.
How we can help
- Name the category that actually fits, and say when family sponsorship is not the route.
- Check the sponsor’s bars, the undertaking length, and whether Quebec’s second promise applies.
- Prepare the sponsorship and the permanent-residence forms together, including police certificates and medical exams.
Family Sponsorship
The family class is the defined list above, not “any relative.”
How we can help
- Screen the sponsor before the relative pays for documents.
- If the person will live in Quebec, sequence the federal assessment and the Quebec undertaking so one is not filed as if it were the other.
Spouse, Common-Law, or Conjugal Partner
Which relationship it is
- Spouse — a marriage that was legally valid where it happened and is recognized in Canada.
- Common-law — at least 12 continuous months living together in a conjugal relationship.
- Conjugal — the partner is outside Canada, the relationship has lasted at least one year, and they could not live together because of a serious barrier, such as immigration status or marital law. It is not a shortcut for a couple who preferred not to marry or live together.
Where the file is filed
- Inland — the spouse or common-law partner is already in Canada. They can usually stay while the file is processed if they have status, and may be able to apply for an open work permit. They generally should not travel without a visa or an authorization that lets them return.
- Overseas — the partner is abroad. Family class, processed at a visa office.
What has to be true
- The relationship is genuine. A marriage entered mainly to get status can be refused as bad faith, and a later sponsorship can be affected for years.
- The undertaking is three years.
- There is no income test for a spouse or partner, unless the sponsor is also sponsoring a dependent child who has a dependent child of their own.
- A person who was themselves sponsored as a spouse usually cannot sponsor a new spouse until a period has passed.
How we can help
- Choose inland or overseas from where the partner actually is, and from whether they can travel.
- Assemble proof the relationship is genuine, and flag a previous sponsorship before the form is sent.
- If they are inland and eligible, prepare the open work permit alongside the sponsorship.
Child or Other Dependent
- A dependent child is under 22 and does not have a spouse or common-law partner.
- A child 22 or older can still be a dependant if they have depended on a parent for financial support because of a physical or mental condition since before they turned 22, and they still do.
- Age locks at a defined point in the process. A child who turns 22 after that point is not automatically dropped.
- The child can be the sponsor’s own child or an adopted child. The adoption has to meet the law of the child’s country and Canadian rules, including the Hague Convention where it applies.
- A child who is already a citizen is not sponsored.
- A child in Canada without status is a different and more urgent problem than a straightforward overseas sponsorship. The file has to follow the child’s actual status.
How we can help
- Lock the age question and the adoption question before the application is built.
- If the child is in Canada without status, treat that as its own file, not as a standard overseas dependent.
Parents and Grandparents
The program does not stay open all year. IRCC has used an interest-to-sponsor form and then invitations, because more people want to sponsor than the levels plan allows. A form from an old round is not a live invitation. Each round has its own instructions.
What the sponsor lines up
- Income at the low-income cut-off for the family size, plus 30 percent, on tax documents for the three tax years before the application.
- An undertaking of 20 years.
- A spouse or partner may co-sign. Their income can count. They take on the same undertaking.
If the round is closed
- The Super Visa is a long visitor stay for a parent or grandparent. It is not permanent residence and it is not “halfway sponsored.” It is described under Visitor.
- When a round is open, the permanent file is a separate application, with income documents, police certificates, and medical exams.
How we can help
- Check three years of income against the current cut-off plus 30 percent before anyone enters an interest form.
- If the round is closed or the income test fails, prepare a Super Visa instead of a sponsorship that cannot be filed.
Refugee Sponsorship
Private sponsorship of refugees is not family sponsorship, even when a family starts it.
- A Sponsorship Agreement Holder, a Group of Five, or a Community Sponsor supports the person, usually for one year.
- The person is abroad and has been recognized as needing resettlement, or is being referred. There is no form to “join the list” alone.
- Blended visa office-referred cases split support between the government and the private group.
- A Group of Five cannot sponsor someone only because the members care about them. The person has to meet the refugee definition and the stream rules, and the group has to show it can house and support them.
- This is resettlement from outside Canada. An inland refugee claim is on the Refugee page.
How we can help
- Say whether the relative abroad actually fits resettlement, and which kind of sponsor group is required.
- Keep a family-class file and a refugee-sponsorship file from being started as if they were the same application.
Other
The “other relative” category is narrow on purpose.
- The sponsor has no spouse, common-law partner, child, parent, grandparent, or sibling who is a citizen or permanent resident, and no such relative abroad whom they could sponsor.
- In that situation the sponsor may sponsor one relative of any age, related by blood or adoption.
- A separate rule covers an orphaned close relative under 18 who is not married and not in a common-law relationship.
- If none of the named categories fit, family sponsorship is not the route. A work permit, a study permit, or a skilled-worker program might be. Those are different pages.
How we can help
- Test the “no one else to sponsor” rule against the real family, including siblings.
- If it fails, point to the temporary or skilled route that does fit, instead of forcing this category.
