It’s well known that approval rates decline for repeat study permit1 applicants to Canada. But just how much do these numbers drop? We delved into the latest data, and the results are actually better than you might expect. 58% of repeat student visa applicants were eventually accepted into Canada.
Key Insights at a Glance
- First-time applicants had an approval rate of 68% across nearly 1.6 million study permit applications from January 2016 to October 2021.
- Among students who applied four times or more for a student visa, 40% were eventually approved.
- Over 215,000 students did not reapply for a study permit to Canada after their first attempt was refused.
We mined the data of nearly 2 million study permit applications to Canada from January 2016 to October 2021.2 Though approval rates declined with each subsequent application, overall more than 170,000 students were approved for a student visa after their first application was refused. This shows that students should not lose heart if their initial study permit application is not approved, and that recruitment partners (RPs) and schools should continue to offer full support for repeat applicants.
How Many Students are Reapplying for Canadian Student Visas?
Of the nearly 1.6 million first-time applicants from January 2016 through October 2021, over 1 million students were approved for a study permit. This represents an approval rate of about 68%. This also means that the aggregate approval rate number—63% for all applicants, first time or repeat, from January 2016 to October 2021—understates the success rate of first-time applicants.
That leaves more than 500,000 students who were not approved on their first attempt. The chart below shows how many students reapplied. We’ve omitted data after the eighth application to protect student privacy.
| Application Number | Students who Reapplied | Students Refused the Previous Year | Percent that Reapplied |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2 | 294,947 | 512,960 | 57% |
| 3 | 67,401 | 157,472 | 43% |
| 4 | 18,903 | 42,121 | 45% |
| 5 | 6,112 | 13,388 | 46% |
| 6 | 2,100 | 4,708 | 45% |
| 7 | 745 | 1,720 | 43% |
| 8 | 294 | 641 | 46% |
Source: IRCC
Only 57% of refused students submitted a second application, and the reapplication rate for each subsequent attempt was less than 50%. Over 215,000 prospective students did not reapply after their first application attempt. If just 10% of this group submitted a successful student visa application, that would have brought more than 20,000 new students to Canada.
What Is the Approval Rate for Repeat Student Visa Applications to Canada?
As we highlighted above, more than 170,000 students were eventually approved on a repeat student visa application to Canada. In other words, 58% of students who reapplied were accepted. Let’s see how approval rates looked during each subsequent study permit application to Canada.
The approval rate for repeat student visa applicants declines the more often a student reapplies. However, even for a seventh and eighth application attempt, about 15% of students were approved. More than 500 students were approved to study in Canada after six or more applications. So while the odds of application success goes down the more a student reapplies, students shouldn’t give up, and RPs and schools shouldn’t quit on them.
Approval Rate for Repeat Student Visa Applications by Canadian Province and Study Level
We also delved into approval rates for repeat study permit applicants across Canada’s provinces and by study level. Let’s take a look. You can click on individual provinces on the graph below to highlight their performance.3
We did not find any real outliers. Provinces with a high approval rate for first time applicants—such as British Columbia (76%), Ontario (69%), and Alberta (68%)—generally maintained higher approval rates for repeat applicants.
We found similar trends when we looked at repeat student visa applications by study level.4 However, an interesting outlier was master’s studies. This study level saw the largest percentage point drop as it shifted from the third-highest approval rate for first-time applicants to the third-lowest for a fifth-time applicant. You can highlight individual study levels in the graph below by clicking on the legend.
We delved into the post-pandemic recovery of study permit approval rates for Canadian colleges and universities last year.
Key Takeaways
Looking solely at the approval rate for each subsequent student visa application attempt does not tell the whole story. 58% of repeat applicants eventually were accepted for a study permit to Canada from 2016 through October 2021. And there were over 215,000 prospective students who did not try a second time after their first application was refused! Reaching and supporting these individuals could open a whole new door for Canadian institutions.
Our recommendation for students is, first and foremost, don’t give up. Connecting with a Regulated Canadian Immigration Consultant (RCIC) can help identify areas to strengthen your application. This is especially true for mature students, as approval rates tend to be lower for older applicants.
For RPs and schools, we understand that resources are limited and it may be tempting to prioritize first-time applicants due to their higher approval rates. However, we found that this higher approval rate is, overall, only 10 percentage points more than repeat applicants. We believe that there is untapped potential within the repeat applicant cohort. These students are passionate and driven, and helping them gain access to education will foster immeasurable word-of-mouth goodwill among those students’ communities. We look forward to continuing our work with our partners to help reach these students.
Published: February 3, 2022
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FOOTNOTES:
1. The terms student visa and study permit are generally used interchangeably for Canadian international students. Rather than student visas, Canada provides accepted international students with study permits, which allow those students to enroll in classes at Canadian institutions. When a student is accepted for a study permit, they are also usually provided with a visitor visa, which allows that student to enter Canada for their studies. For the purposes of this article, we’ll use the terms interchangeably.
2. All data courtesy of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), except where noted. More recent data not yet available.
3. The only provinces with more than 100 applicants for a sixth attempt were British Columbia, Ontario, and Quebec, hence why this graph is for attempts one through five only.
4. It should be noted that the sample size for language studies, primary school, and doctorate studies fell below 100 applications for the fifth attempt.
