Yukon Nominee Program (YNP)

The Yukon Nominee Program is the territory's stream of the Provincial Nominee Program, and it works differently from almost every other PNP in Canada. There is no candidate pool you can register for, no points grid you control, and no application you can file on your own behalf. A Yukon employer submits an Expression of Interest naming you, and if that submission scores highly enough, the employer is invited to apply. The Yukon has 282 nominations for all of 2026.

That structure matters more in 2026 than it ever has, because the territory has moved from year-round intake to two fixed windows and a competitive scoring grid. It also means the older descriptions of Yukon immigration circulating online are now wrong in ways that cost people time. The Yukon Community Pilot is finished. The program has three streams, not five. Only one of those streams connects to Express Entry and the 600-point boost that comes with it.

This page sets out what the Yukon Nominee Program actually looks like now: the three streams and their TEER ranges, the language and experience thresholds, the employer eligibility rules, the exact Expression of Interest scoring grid the territory uses, and how the nomination converts into permanent residence.

If you are weighing the Yukon against neighbouring territories, the Northwest Territories Nominee Program runs on a different model and may suit candidates without a Yukon employer relationship.

What Is the Yukon Nominee Program?

The Yukon Nominee Program (YNP) is administered by the Government of Yukon's Department of Economic Development in partnership with Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. It lets Yukon employers hire or retain a foreign worker when no qualified Canadian citizen or permanent resident is available for the position. If the territory approves the application, it nominates the worker, and the worker then applies to IRCC for permanent residence.

Two features define the program. The first is that it is strictly employer driven. The employer submits every form. Each employer submits one application per foreign worker they want to hire, and the invitation issued is tied to that specific employer and that specific person. It cannot be transferred, deferred or reused. The second is that the job must be year-round, full-time work of 35 to 40 hours per week, paid at the median wage for the position in the Yukon.

The Yukon Business Nominee Program is a separate program with its own rules and is covered further down this page. It is not one of the YNP streams, despite how frequently it is listed as one.

Yukon PNP Streams in 2026

There are three streams. The employer selects the stream based on the National Occupational Classification TEER category of the position being filled.

Yukon Skilled Worker Stream

The Skilled Worker stream covers management positions and jobs requiring higher education or specialised training, meaning positions classified as TEER 0, 1, 2 or 3. The foreign worker needs 12 months of relevant work experience for the role being offered. This is a base nomination, so a successful nominee applies to IRCC directly rather than through the federal pool.

Yukon Critical Impact Worker Stream

The Critical Impact Worker stream covers entry-level positions in TEER 4 and TEER 5. The experience requirement drops to six months of relevant work experience. This is the stream that carries most of the Yukon's hospitality, retail, food service and support-role hiring, and it is also a base nomination.

Yukon Express Entry Stream

The Express Entry stream is for foreign nationals already accepted into the IRCC Express Entry pool under the Canadian Experience Class, the Federal Skilled Worker Program or the Federal Skilled Trades Program. Positions must fall in TEER 0 through 3. This is the only enhanced stream in the Yukon, which means the nomination attaches to your federal profile and adds 600 points to your Comprehensive Ranking System score. In practice that guarantees an Invitation to Apply in the next eligible draw. If you are deciding between routes, our comparison of Express Entry and the PNP explains how the two systems interact.

Yukon Community Pilot Program Status

The Yukon Community Program, often searched for as the Yukon Community Pilot, was a pilot stream that let a nominated worker hold a location-restricted open work permit and work part-time or seasonal hours for up to three employers in a participating community. It concluded in 2025 in accordance with the Government of Yukon's agreement with IRCC.

This is worth stating plainly because several high-ranking commercial immigration pages still describe the Yukon Community Pilot as a current or new stream, and at least one still gives its end date as June 2023. It is not available in 2026 and there is no successor stream. If you were told you could combine several part-time Yukon job offers into a nomination, that route no longer exists. The Yukon still prioritises rural employers, but it does so through the scoring grid described below rather than through a separate stream.

Yukon Nominee Program Requirements for Foreign Workers

The worker-side requirements are shorter than most PNPs, because so much of the assessment sits with the employer.

Language Requirements

The Canadian Language Benchmark thresholds are CLB 6 for TEER 0 and 1 positions, CLB 5 for TEER 2 and 3, and CLB 4 for TEER 4 and 5. Results must come from a designated testing organization and be less than two years old. Express Entry candidates must additionally meet the federal minimums for their program.

Work Experience and Education

Twelve months of relevant experience for the Skilled Worker stream, six months for Critical Impact Worker. Education, skills and experience must be documented and must genuinely match the role. A nominee may later change positions inside the same company, but only if the minimum experience for the new position is met.

Status in Canada

If you are already in Canada you need valid status to work. Refugee claimants and people in Canada on visitor status are not eligible. You can apply from outside Canada, but the scoring grid heavily rewards people already living and working in the territory, which is the single most important thing to understand about your realistic odds.

Yukon Nominee Program Employer Requirements

The employer carries most of the eligibility burden. To use the program, an employer must be a Canadian citizen or permanent resident, hold all current and valid licences, pay the median wage for the position, and demonstrate genuine unsuccessful recruitment of Canadians and permanent residents. They must have been operating in the Yukon for at least one year as a registered Yukon business with a Yukon office, or as an industry association or a municipal or First Nation government for at least one year, or as a non-profit for at least two years with funding secured for the coming year.

Recruitment evidence is scrutinised in detail. The application asks which platforms were used, how many Canadians and permanent residents applied, how many were interviewed, and why each was not hired. It also asks how many of the employer's full-time staff are foreign workers or active nominees, and whether anyone was released from the position in the previous 12 months. Full program documentation is published on the Government of Yukon's Yukon Nominee Program page.

Businesses That Cannot Use the Program

Certain business types are excluded outright: bed and breakfasts with fewer than 10 rooms, hobby farms, home-based businesses and distribution operations, taxi-cab companies, businesses owned and operated by active Yukon business nominees, passive investments, business consultation and personal services, real estate, and holding companies. The Government of Yukon also does not currently use the YNP to recruit for its own positions.

Yukon PNP Expression of Interest Process and 2026 Intake Dates

The Expression of Interest is not an application. It is a short online form the employer submits during an intake window, giving basic information about the business, the position and the named foreign worker. The territory scores every EOI received in that window and invites the highest scoring employers to apply.

2026 Intake Dates

The first intake ran January 19 to January 30, with invitations sent February 9 to 13 and applications due March 4. The second intake ran July 6 to July 17, with invitations sent August 3 to 7, employer information sessions on August 10 or 12, and applications due August 26. Expressions of Interest do not carry forward. An EOI submitted in 2025 or in the January 2026 intake had to be resubmitted in full, with current information, to be considered in July.

How the Yukon Scores Expressions of Interest

The 2026 scoring grid is short and unusually revealing about the territory's priorities:

Read that grid carefully, because it tells you where the leverage actually is. A regulated health care role is worth more than four years of Yukon residence. French at CLB/NCLC 5 across all four abilities is worth more than three years of residence, and IRCC has indicated that nominees meeting that French threshold do not count against the Yukon's allocation at all, which gives employers a direct incentive to prioritise them. A Yukon University credential is worth a single point. Where ties occur, the candidate with the longest consecutive period living and working in the Yukon is selected first, and if a tie remains, the candidate whose work permit expires soonest.

How the 282 Nominations Are Divided

Allocation mechanics are the part almost nobody publishes. After accounting for holders of a Temporary Measure Letter of Support, 85 per cent of the remaining nominations go to Whitehorse-based employers and 15 per cent to employers in rural communities. Seventy-five per cent of the allocation was released through the first intake and 25 per cent through the second, with slots freed by withdrawals or refusals in the first round redistributed into the second. Whitehorse and its surrounding area, including Ibex Valley, Marsh Lake, Mount Lorne, Hidden Valley, Grizzly Valley and Mendenhall, now runs through a separate process from the rural communities.

How to Apply for the Yukon Nominee Program

Step 1: The Employer Advertises the Position

The employer advertises locally and nationally and documents the outcome. No qualified Canadian or permanent resident can be available for the role.

Step 2: The Employer Offers a Permanent Full-Time Position

The offer must be year-round and full-time at 35 to 40 hours per week, at median wage, to a worker who meets the stream requirements.

Step 3: The Employer Submits an Expression of Interest

The employer completes the EOI online form during an open intake and the consent to share information form, which has sections for both the employer and the worker.

Step 4: The Yukon Scores and Issues Invitations

Every EOI in the window is scored against the grid. Every employer who submitted is notified of the outcome, whether invited or not. Unsuccessful employers may submit again in the next intake.

Step 5: The Employer Attends an Information Session

Attendance is mandatory for invited employers, including those who already attended a session in an earlier round.

Step 6: The Employer Files the Full Application

The application must document everything claimed in the EOI, and it must be submitted in hard copy, in person or by mail, before the deadline. Incomplete applications are returned unprocessed. Discrepancies between the EOI and the application can be grounds for refusal and future exclusion from the program.

Step 7: Sign the Tripartite Agreement

If approved, the employer and nominee attend an in-person meeting to sign a Tripartite Agreement with the Government of Yukon. Compliance checks can occur at any time afterwards.

Step 8: Apply for Permanent Residence Within Six Months

The nominee has six months from approval to file the permanent residence application with IRCC. Until PR is granted, the nominee holds a temporary work permit.

Yukon PNP Processing Time and Nomination Allocation

The Yukon does not publish a processing standard for 2026 and has said so directly. Because applications arrive in concentrated batches after each invitation round, some are assessed far sooner than others. The only commitment made is that all 2026 applications will be assessed by December 31, 2026, since the 282 nominations expire on that date and cannot be carried forward. The 12 to 14 week figure that appears on many older pages described the previous year-round intake and no longer applies.

There is no fee to apply to the Yukon Nominee Program in 2026. Federal costs for permanent residence, work permits and biometrics are charged separately by IRCC. The full 2026 rules, including the scoring grid and intake mechanics, are set out in the Yukon Nominee Program 2026 Operational Guidance.

Yukon Business Nominee Program Requirements

The Yukon Business Nominee Program is the territory's entrepreneur route and runs separately from the employer-driven YNP. Applicants are scored on a point grid covering investment level, net worth, education, business experience, language, age and prior visits to the Yukon, with a minimum of 65 points required.

The financial thresholds are a net worth of at least CAD $500,000 and at least CAD $300,000 in liquid assets, both verified by a Yukon accounting firm as legally obtained, plus a minimum CAD $300,000 capital investment in the Yukon business. Applicants must intend to live permanently in the Yukon, hold a TEER 0 or 1 position within their own business, and must not have already purchased or started the Yukon business before applying. Successful candidates receive support for a two-year work permit to establish the business, and territorial support for permanent residence follows only after the performance requirements of that period are met.

Yukon Permanent Residence After Nomination

What the nomination does depends entirely on the stream. An Express Entry stream nomination is linked to your federal profile and adds 600 CRS points, which in practice secures an Invitation to Apply in the next eligible draw and puts you into a six-month federal processing standard. A Skilled Worker or Critical Impact Worker nomination is a base nomination, so you file a paper permanent residence application with IRCC and should expect a longer federal timeline.

In both cases the six-month deadline to file with IRCC is firm, and the federal decision is entirely IRCC's. The Government of Yukon cannot change a work permit or permanent residence decision, and it cannot advise on federal work permit extensions.

Who Cannot Use the Yukon Nominee Program

• Foreign nationals without a Yukon employer willing to submit on their behalf, including those whose employer simply declines to participate
• Refugee claimants and people in Canada on visitor status
• Candidates whose employer was not invited to apply in the intake, with no exception process available
• Workers in seasonal or part-time roles, since positions must be year-round and 35 to 40 hours per week
• Workers whose employer falls into one of the excluded business categories
• Candidates whose invited employer relationship ended, since an invitation cannot follow the worker to a new employer
• Anyone found to have submitted falsified or misleading information, who is disqualified from Yukon immigration programs entirely

If you have a Yukon job offer, hold a Temporary Measure Letter of Support, or are an employer trying to work out whether your business qualifies and how your Expression of Interest is likely to score, SEP Immigration can assess your position and prepare the file. Sepehr Falahati is a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant with the College of Immigration and Citizenship Consultants, CICC/IRB R533959, and our team handles both worker-side and employer-side preparation for territorial nominee programs.

Disclaimer: This page is general information about the Yukon Nominee Program and is not legal advice, and YNP streams, priorities, scoring, intake dates and nomination allocations change. Information here reflects Government of Yukon sources current as of August 2026, and you should verify current requirements at yukon.ca or with a licensed immigration representative before acting on anything here.