In this guide
What is student loan forgiveness?
Student loan forgiveness allows individuals with student loan debt to have all or part of their debt forgiven or cancelled. The borrower no longer has to pay back the remaining debt.
Canada has no broad student loan debt forgiveness program, but it is typically offered to health and social service workers in small communities through provincial student loan forgiveness programs and grants.
For everyone else, it can be described as payment relief through the Repayment Assistance Program (RAP) offered by the federal government, or clearing the debt through a consumer proposal or bankruptcy once enough time has passed.
Most Canadians borrow through the federal Canada Student Financial Assistance Program, often combined with a provincial loan like OSAP in Ontario.
Private loans and student lines of credit from a bank work differently, and they don’t qualify for the government forgiveness programs, but they can be eliminated through a consumer proposal or bankruptcy under the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act.
Are Canada Student Loans interest-free?
Since April 1, 2023, Canada Student Loans and Canada Apprentice Loans have been permanently interest-free, including loans already in repayment. More than 1.2 million graduates a year benefit from that change.
Interest can still build on the provincial portion of Ontario and Saskatchewan integrated loans, so check which part of your loan it applies to.
The main ways to get student loan relief in Canada
If you need help with student loan debt, there are many options. Depending on your situation, you might qualify for reduced payments, debt forgiveness tied to your job, or a formal insolvency filing that clears your debt completely.
Here’s how the main options compare.
| Option | Who it’s for | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP) | Anyone with a federal loan who can’t afford payments | Reduced or $0 monthly payments. Government covers interest, then principal after 60 months |
| Occupation-based forgiveness | Doctors, nurses and other essential workers in small communities | Up to $60,000, $30,000 or $15,000 off the federal balance over 5 years, by profession |
| Consumer proposal | People 7 or more years out of school with debt they can’t repay | Settles government student loans and other unsecured debt for less than the full amount |
| Bankruptcy | People 7 or more years out of school with few assets | Clears government student loans along with other unsecured debt |
| Provincial programs | Graduates in BC, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, Newfoundland and Labrador, PEI and Quebec | Partial or full forgiveness of the provincial loan. Rules vary by province |
The rest of this guide breaks down each one.
Repayment Assistance Plan
The Repayment Assistance Plan (RAP) is the federal government’s main tool for borrowers who can’t keep up with payments. It reduces or eliminates your payments depending on your family size and income.
While it’s not exactly debt forgiveness, the government will pay your loan payments for as long as you are eligible for repayment assistance, and it stops the balance from growing.
If you’re single and your gross monthly family income is $3,788 or less, you pay nothing while you’re on RAP. That’s around $45,000 a year, and the threshold rises with family size. Earn more than that, and you can still qualify for reduced payments capped at your income.
Source: Government of Canada – Repayment Assistance Plan
Stay on RAP long enough, and the government starts paying down your principal too, after 60 months on the plan or 10 years after you leave school.
Around 288,000 borrowers used RAP in the 2023 to 2024 academic year.
To qualify for repayment assistance, your Canada Student Loan or Canada Apprentice Loan has to be in repayment and your payments up to date. You also need to live in Canada, though you still qualify if you’re a reservist, the spouse of a reservist deployed abroad, or on an international internship of a year or less.
You must complete an application every six months through the National Student Loans Service Centre (NSLSC). This program can provide much-needed financial relief for individuals struggling to repay their student loan debt.
Student loan debt forgiveness for doctors, nurses and essential workers
If you work in health care or social services in a small community, you can have part of your federal student loan forgiven outright. This is the closest thing Canada has to a straight student loan cancellation, and the list of who qualifies just got a lot longer.
As of December 31, 2025, the program covers three groups, and how much you get depends on your profession.
| Maximum forgiven over 5 years | Who qualifies |
|---|---|
| $60,000 | Family doctors, family medicine residents, dentists, psychologists and pharmacists |
| $30,000 | Nurses, nurse practitioners, midwives, teachers, social workers and physiotherapists |
| $15,000 | Early childhood educators, dental hygienists and personal support workers |
Source: Government of Canada – Canada Student Loan Forgiveness
To qualify, you must work in an eligible underserved community of 30,000 people or fewer and complete at least 400 hours of in-person service in a year. For teachers, early childhood educators, psychologists and social workers based in a school, that year of service means 10 consecutive months instead.
Forgiveness applies to your federal balance after 12 months of service, and you keep making payments in the meantime. You can claim it for up to five years, and those years don’t have to run consecutively.
Clearing student loans through bankruptcy or a consumer proposal
When your student debt is part of a bigger debt load that you can’t repay, a consumer proposal or bankruptcy can wipe out government student loans under the seven-year rule. Both are filed through a Licensed Insolvency Trustee.
The seven-year rule
Under section 178 of the Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, government student loans are only cleared in a proposal or bankruptcy if at least seven years have passed since you were last a student.
Source: Government of Canada – Bankruptcy and Insolvency Act, section 178
There’s an exception. If it’s been five years and you’ve made a genuine effort to repay, you can ask the court to clear the debt early on the grounds of hardship, but there is no guarantee the court agrees to discharge the debt.
In 2025, the Supreme Court confirmed the clock runs from the last date you stopped being a student, even if you paid for that later study yourself. If you go back to school, the count restarts. That resets both the seven-year rule and the five-year hardship route, because both run from the same date.
Source: Supreme Court of Canada – Piekut v. Canada (National Revenue), 2025 SCC 13
Private student loans are different. A line of credit or bank loan counts as ordinary unsecured debt, so it can go into a proposal or bankruptcy right away, with no seven-year wait.
Provincial programs and other options
Beyond the federal programs, six provinces run their own forgiveness programs for the provincial part of your student loan.
How you earn it depends on where you studied. Some provinces reward finishing the program, others reward professionals who provide in-person services in eligible communities, and one rewards staying in the province after you graduate.
Student debt forgiveness for finishing your program
Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia and Quebec tie forgiveness to completing your studies.
The Newfoundland and Labrador Debt Reduction Grant Program goes furthest, converting up to 100% of your provincial loan into a non-repayable grant when you graduate from an eligible program.
Source: Government of Newfoundland and Labrador – NL Debt Relief
If you are a Nova Scotia student, you can have the provincial portion of your student loan eliminated through the Nova Scotia Student Loan Forgiveness Program. Graduates can receive loan forgiveness for five years, up to a maximum amount of $20,400, when they complete an eligible undergraduate degree on time.
Source: Government of Nova Scotia – Student Loan Forgiveness Program
Quebec’s Loan Remission Program will forgive 15% of a student’s loan debt if they complete a program within a set period and receive a bursary under the Loans and Bursaries Program for every year of study.
Source: Gouvernement du Québec – Loan Remission Program
Student debt forgiveness for working where you’re needed
Saskatchewan and British Columbia base student loan debt forgiveness on your job instead.
The Saskatchewan Student Loan Forgiveness Program forgives up to $20,000 of the provincial loan for nurses, nurse practitioners, veterinarians and veterinary technologists who work in eligible communities.
Source: Government of Saskatchewan – Student Loan Forgiveness
Students who have recently graduated in high-demand occupations can have their B.C. student loans forgiven by working at publicly-funded facilities in underserved communities, or with children in short-staffed occupations.
The B.C. Loan Forgiveness Program clears the provincial portion of your Canada-B.C. integrated loan at a rate of up to 20% per year for a maximum of five years.
If you complete five years of work in an eligible occupation, all (or a percentage) of your student loan debt will be forgiven, including any interest.
Source: StudentAid BC – B.C. Loan Forgiveness Program
Student debt forgiveness for staying in the province
If you’re a student in the province of Prince Edward Island who borrows more than $6000 in federal and provincial student loans each year, you may benefit from PEI’s Debt Reduction Grant Program to help reduce your student loan debt.
Depending on when you started your studies, you could receive up to $2,000 or $3,500 in grants every year.
If you started school before 1 August 2018, you could receive a debt reduction grant of up to $2,000 per year toward your student loan balance. You must apply within one year of graduation.
If you started your studies after 31 July 2018, you could receive up to $3,500 per year. You must apply within three years of graduating.
Source: Government of Prince Edward Island – Debt Reduction Grant
Other ways to ease the student debt load
If student loan forgiveness isn’t available to you yet, you have other options.
You can change your student loan repayment plan to fit your budget. Extending the repayment period spreads the balance over more years, though you pay more interest in total. You can also make interest-only payments for up to 12 months over the life of the loan.
Source: National Student Loans Service Centre – Loan repayment options
The interest-only option matters less than it used to. Since the federal portion of Canada Student Loans is interest-free, it only lowers what you pay on the Ontario or Saskatchewan provincial portion, where interest still builds.
Consolidating a government loan into a private bank loan rarely makes sense. You give up the interest-free status on the federal portion, and you lose access to the Repayment Assistance Plan, which only covers government loans.
If you have a private student loan, then that’s a different story. If it carries a high interest rate, a lower-rate debt consolidation loan can roll it in with your other debts and leave you with one monthly payment. It’s a viable option when debt forgiveness and government relief don’t apply.
Frequently asked questions
Is there student loan forgiveness in Canada?
Yes, but there’s not one single program. You can reduce your payments through the Repayment Assistance Plan, get debt forgiveness if you work in an eligible occupation, and eliminate government loans through a consumer proposal or bankruptcy once you’ve been out of school for seven years.
How do you apply for student loan forgiveness in Canada?
For the Repayment Assistance Plan, you apply through the National Student Loans Service Centre and reapply every six months. For the forgiveness aimed at doctors, nurses and other eligible workers, you apply after 12 months of qualifying service, and to clear loans through a consumer proposal or bankruptcy, you file with a Licensed Insolvency Trustee.
Do student loans go away after 10 years in Canada?
There is a statute of limitations on government student loans, but it limits legal collection action rather than wiping out the debt. For most federal and provincial student loans, including Canada Student Loans, Canada Apprentice Loans, and the Saskatchewan provincial portion, the limitation period is generally six years from the date the loan comes into effect.
Exceptions apply if a court judgment extends the period, which can range from 10 years to unlimited depending on the province, or if the loan was established or expired before August 1, 2003, in which case no limitation period applies. Even after the period passes, you still owe the money, and the CRA can continue collecting through offsets like your tax refund.
Does bankruptcy clear student loans?
Bankruptcy eliminates government student loans if at least seven years have passed since you were last a student. If you file for bankruptcy, your student loan will be forgiven along with any other unsecured debts.
If it’s been five years, you can ask the court to clear the debt early on the grounds of hardship, but there is no guarantee the court agrees to discharge the debt. Private student loans can be included right away, like any other unsecured debt.
Are private student loans eligible for forgiveness?
No. Private student loans and bank lines of credit don’t qualify for government forgiveness or the Repayment Assistance Plan. You can still resolve them by negotiating new terms with your lender, consolidating them into a lower-rate loan, or including them in a consumer proposal or bankruptcy, where they count as ordinary unsecured debt.
What happens to your student loans if you die?
Government student loans are cancelled when the borrower dies and are not passed to your family or estate. Private student loans are handled by the lender and may be claimed against your estate, so the treatment depends on the loan.
Can you get a new student loan after bankruptcy or a proposal?
In some cases, yes. You have to disclose any past bankruptcy or consumer proposal when you apply, and some provincial student aid programs make you wait a set number of years before you can borrow again. Some provinces will restrict or deny future loans if you are currently in an insolvency proceeding.
Get student debt advice from a Licensed Insolvency Trustee
If your student debt has become unmanageable, you don’t have to work it out alone. A Licensed Insolvency Trustee can review your full situation and walk you through every option, from repayment assistance to a consumer proposal. The first consultation is free, and there’s no obligation.
