Are Heat Pumps Worth It in Canada? [2026]

Whether a heat pump is worth it in Canada depends on what it replaces and what electricity costs in your province. Against electric baseboards or an electric furnace, Natural Resources Canada (NRCan) says a heat pump delivers up to twice the heat per unit of electricity, and Efficiency Canada puts the running-cost saving at $700–$1,900 a year. Against a gas furnace that saving falls to $50–$150 a year in most regions, and on October 2026 rates our calculation finds a heat pump in Ontario or Manitoba would need to deliver more than four units of heat per unit of electricity (a COP above 4) to match a gas furnace’s running cost.

Researched and edited by Gabriel Reyes. Last reviewed: October 2026.

We don’t sell or install heat pumps and we earn no commission on them. For how each heating system works, see our home heating and cooling guides.

When does a heat pump pay off in Canada?

NRCan and Efficiency Canada compare a heat pump with each fuel it might replace:

If you heat with	NRCan: standard heat pump	NRCan: cold-climate heat pump	Efficiency Canada: yearly running-cost saving
Oil	Up to 2.5x	Up to 3x	$1,000–$3,500
Electric baseboards or electric furnace	Up to 2x	Up to 2.5x	$700–$1,900
Natural gas	Up to 2.5x	Up to 3.5x	$50–$150 in most regions, plus $150–$300 in gas fixed charges if you remove the gas service

Sources: NRCan, Heat pump basics (page modified July 2025); the multiples are “up to” seasonal averages that vary by location and by the system replaced. Efficiency Canada (published August 2023, updated March 2026) cites no source for its figures and states no currency; we read them as Canadian dollars. Checked October 2026.

A multiple compares the energy used and says nothing about the dollars spent. Electricity usually costs more than gas per unit of heat, which is why the gas row shows the smallest saving. The running-cost section below puts numbers on that for three provinces.

The Canadian Climate Institute modelled the lifetime annual cost of heating and cooling a 1,770 sq ft house, including equipment, installation and operation. Its 2023 study (with a correction note from March 2024) finds that in Toronto the cheapest option for almost every home is a heat pump with gas backup. Edmonton gives the same result for homes built in 1940 and 1980, and gas heat with central air wins for the other Edmonton homes. In Vancouver, Montreal and Halifax, a heat pump with electric backup beats gas heat with central air even in the study’s worst scenario. The study does not model oil or propane, and it shows its city results in charts without readable figures. See the full study.

Statistics Canada counts 8% of households with a heat pump as their main heating system in 2023, up from 6% in 2021, and 23% with electric baseboards (table 38-10-0286-01).

Start from what you heat with today. If it is baseboards or oil, ask for heat pump quotes now. If it is gas, ask each installer to price a heat pump against your own gas and electricity bills, and count the air conditioner you would stop buying.

For the side-by-side comparison of the two systems, read our guide to heat pump vs furnace.

What a heat pump costs to install in Canada

The per-system prices we found come from two Ontario installers. That’s one short of our three-source rule for a range, so the table shows each source side by side:

System	IKAD (Ontario)	EcoFrost (Greater Toronto Area)	furnaceprices.ca (comparator)
Ductless, one zone	$4,500–$7,500	$3,500–$5,500	$5,000–$8,000
Ductless, multi-zone	$9,000–$18,000	$6,000–$13,000	$8,000–$16,000+
Ducted, standard	Not published	$5,500–$11,000	$7,000–$12,000
Ducted, cold-climate	$7,500–$13,000	$6,500–$14,000	$12,000–$18,000+
Heat pump added to a gas furnace	$11,500–$18,000	Not published	Not published

Sources: IKAD (article dated July 2026; the ducted figure assumes existing ducts), EcoFrost Heating (2026 guide) and furnaceprices.ca (updated September 2026), a comparator whose figures are base prices for metro areas, with 5–15% added for suburbs and 20–40% for rural homes. Checked October 2026. None of the three says whether GST/HST is included.

The two installers’ ranges for ducted cold-climate systems overlap, and the comparator sits above both. Ask each installer for a written price per system type, so you can see where yours falls.

What owners say they paid

A national owner survey by Clean Energy Canada asked what owners paid before incentives. The share of owners in each band, by system type:

System	Up to $10,000	$10,000–$20,000	Over $20,000
Cold-climate central ducted	29%	51%	14%
Conventional central ducted	45%	40%	6%
Mini-split	54%	32%	7%

Source: Clean Energy Canada, Heat Pump Owners Have Their Say (March 2026), installation cost chart; we added the survey’s adjacent bands. The rest answered “not sure” or skipped the question (5%, 10% and 7%). The survey is a convenience sample (see the owner section below).

Of the owners with cold-climate ducted systems, 65% paid more than $10,000, roughly the midpoint of both installers’ ranges for that system. Single comments in the Ontario threads we read land on both sides of the installer ranges:

• $7,100 for a heat pump and coil in Toronto (year not stated; the owner says it was covered by a rebate, which we don’t count).
• $11,200 for a 2-stage furnace plus a 24,000 BTU heat pump in the Ottawa area, bought in March 2025 (r/ottawa).
• About $18,500 for a ducted all-electric system that replaced a gas furnace and air conditioner in a 3,000 sq ft home in southwestern Ontario (around 2023), plus about $2,000 to upgrade the panel to 200 A. That price sits above the top of both installers’ ducted ranges, and the owner doesn’t say whether it was before or after his grant.

Those three prices sit $11,400 apart, and none of the comments says exactly what the price covered.

Alberta, British Columbia and the Prairies

We found one Alberta installer price: Action Furnace says Alberta installations usually fall within $8,000–$18,000 (published May 2026, no breakdown by system). In British Columbia, Green Building Canada averages quotes that buyers shared on Reddit: $17,796–$22,693 for ducted systems of 1.5 to 4 tons and $5,926–$6,334 for mini-splits (published December 2024, updated July 2025). A Burnaby installer, BC Wide, lists $10,000–$18,000 for adding a heat pump to a gas furnace (September 2026). We have not found published heat pump prices from Manitoba or Saskatchewan installers.

Green Building Canada also lists costs that often sit outside a heat pump quote: insulation and air sealing at $1,000–$15,000, an electrical panel upgrade at $1,000–$10,000, and duct repairs at $1,000–$5,000. Ask each installer which of these your home needs and whether they are in the price.

GST/HST is 5% in Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and Saskatchewan and 13% (HST) in Ontario, according to the Canada Revenue Agency. We haven’t captured how PST applies to installations, so ask whether each quote is before or after tax. Federal and provincial incentive programs have changed since 2024, so we leave their amounts out of every figure here and suggest you check the program’s official page before you budget.

Whenever your air conditioner needs replacing, compare these prices with our ranges for central air conditioner cost.

What a heat pump costs to run, province by province

Running cost depends on three numbers: your electricity rate, your gas rate and how many units of heat the heat pump delivers per unit of electricity (its COP). The arithmetic is short, and you can repeat it with your own bills:

• Electricity: rate in cents per kWh × 277.8 kWh per GJ ÷ 100 = dollars per GJ of electricity; divide by the COP to get dollars per GJ of heat.
• Gas: rate in dollars per GJ ÷ the furnace’s AFUE (95% is the federal minimum for new gas furnaces).
• Break-even COP: electricity cost per GJ ÷ gas cost per GJ of heat.

Province	Gas furnace, $ per GJ of heat	Heat pump at COP 3, $ per GJ of heat	COP needed to match gas
Ontario	$7.4–$8.0	$11.1–$13.1	4.2–5.3
British Columbia	$11.6–$11.7	$11.0–$13.0	2.8–3.4
Manitoba	$6.0	$9.2	4.6

Rates captured October 2026. Ontario: OEB tiered electricity at 12.0–14.2 c/kWh (changes November 1, 2026) and Enbridge Gas at 27.8–29.8 c/m³ for delivery, transport and gas, before HST and the $27.69 monthly fixed charge (fixed charges are left out of every figure in the table). British Columbia: BC Hydro at 11.87 and 14.08 c/kWh, and FortisBC gas at $11.10 per GJ (delivery, transport and gas). Manitoba: Manitoba Hydro electricity at 9.97 c/kWh and gas at 22.43 c/m³ (commodity plus delivery). Gas converted at 39.08 GJ per 1,000 m³ (Enbridge, southern Ontario); we applied the same value in Manitoba because we haven’t captured Manitoba Hydro’s own. Furnace efficiency 95–96% AFUE. COP 3 is an illustration.

The table says three things:

• Ontario and Manitoba: at a COP of 3, a heat pump costs about 40–80% more than a gas furnace per GJ of heat in Ontario and about 50% more in Manitoba (11.1 ÷ 8.0 and 13.1 ÷ 7.4 in Ontario; 9.2 ÷ 6.0 in Manitoba).
• British Columbia: the two come out close, and a COP between 2.8 and 3.4 is enough to match gas.
• The rates favour the heat pump. The electricity rates above cover energy only, without delivery or regulatory charges, while the gas figures include delivery. Adding the electricity charges raises the COP you would need.

NRCan publishes only “up to” multiples and no seasonal COP, so the break-even column is the number to hold on to: it doesn’t depend on any assumption about the unit. NRCan’s ENERGY STAR page lists air-to-air models with a COP at −8 °C between 1.1 and 3.7. Ask each installer for the seasonal COP of the model it quotes, and ask where that number comes from.

Fixed charges can tip the result. Efficiency Canada puts gas fixed charges at $150–$300 a year, which you save only if you cancel gas service. Enbridge’s Rate 1 fixed charge is $27.69 a month, or $332 a year, so Ontario homes can save more than Efficiency Canada’s range. Cancelling means moving every gas appliance: one Ontario owner kept the gas connection for a stovetop, a barbecue and a fireplace. Another owner, who plans to cancel gas, estimates a heat pump would cost him $200–$300 a year more to run than his gas furnace and that he would save about $600 a year in connection fees. He doesn’t give his province, and the $600 is his own estimate.

Alberta, Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia. We don’t compare these provinces because we haven’t captured the delivery charges for their gas or electricity, and a comparison without them would mislead. Use your last 12 months of bills instead: add up the total you paid for gas, including delivery, and divide by the GJ you used; then take your all-in electricity price in cents per kWh, multiply by 277.8 and divide by 100 to get dollars per GJ, and divide that by the COP your installer quotes.

Rates move on a schedule. Ontario’s electricity prices change on November 1, Enbridge’s gas rates change each quarter and Alberta’s regulated gas rate changes every month, so check today’s rates before you decide. Our page on how we build our price ranges explains how we date each figure.

How cold weather changes the answer

Colder winters mean more heating hours, so the gap between your electricity and gas costs adds up faster, and cold lowers the heat each unit delivers. Environment and Climate Change Canada’s 1991–2020 normals show how far apart Canadian climates sit:

City	Heating degree-days (base 18 °C)	Compared with Calgary
Vancouver	2,781	44% fewer
Toronto	3,751	25% fewer
Ottawa	4,434	11% fewer
Calgary	4,994	Reference
Winnipeg	5,672	14% more
Edmonton	5,697	14% more

Source: Environment and Climate Change Canada climate normals, 1991–2020 (airport stations), captured October 2026.

Edmonton has about twice Vancouver’s heating degree-days (2.05 times). Cold also changes how much heat a unit delivers, and NRCan’s two pages give different limits. Its Heat pump basics page says cold-climate models operate “well below freezing down to −30 °C”. Its ENERGY STAR page lists a minimum operating temperature of −15 to −25 °C for recent models. We show both and don’t pick one: ask for the model’s heating output at your area’s design temperature in writing.

Below the unit’s range, you need backup heat. Efficiency Canada says backup comes from integrated electric resistance, baseboards or a gas furnace. A southern Alberta owner (design temperature −25.5 °C) reports that his cold-climate unit supplied all the heat down to −24 °C, that a 10 kW backup added heat below that, and that the heat pump shut off at −32 °C during a −38 °C cold snap. Owners elsewhere report backup coming on for other reasons: a front door left open in February, or a thermostat that prioritizes comfort and responsiveness over efficiency.

In the Clean Energy Canada survey, 4% of owners said they had concerns about how their heat pump works in the coldest temperatures and 5% reported ice building up on the unit. Of the Ontario owners who answered during the January 24–25 cold snap, when temperatures fell to −20 °C, 92% would recommend a heat pump.

Does a heat pump pay for itself?

Against gas, savings alone rarely pay back the extra cost. Use this formula: extra up-front cost compared with what you would otherwise buy, divided by the yearly saving. At Efficiency Canada’s $50–$150 a year, every $1,000 of extra cost takes about 7 to 20 years to recover. Our table shows why the saving is small in Ontario and Manitoba. The extra cost shrinks when you retire an air conditioner at the same time, because you buy one system instead of two.

Against electric heat or oil, the saving is large. At Efficiency Canada’s $700–$1,900 (electric) and $1,000–$3,500 (oil), every $1,000 of extra cost is back within about a year and a half. Those figures have no published source, so ask each installer to estimate the saving from your own bills.

Upgrading the furnace can account for part of the gain. A Windsor owner who replaced an 80% furnace and a minimum-efficiency air conditioner with a heat pump and a 97% furnace reports a gas bill that “plummeted” and an electricity bill that rose very little. He adds that, now the grant money is gone, the maths would look quite different. Separate what the heat pump saves from what a better furnace saves when you compare quotes.

Programs change the payback. In the survey, 56% of owners used an incentive, and 53% of those said they would not have installed a heat pump without it. Programs have changed since then, so recheck the official page of any program before you count on it.

What Canadian owners report

Two r/heatpumps threads collect first-hand reports: Canada Heat Pump Stories! (2024) and Canadian heat pump owners are overwhelmingly satisfied… (2026). The posts are anonymous and unverified; where they line up with the studies above, we say so.

• Gas savings are small. Three Ontario owners (two with gas backup, one with electric backup) describe the change in energy cost as a wash, “negligible” after 18 months, and about $100 a winter. That lines up with Efficiency Canada’s $50–$150.
• Electric heat is where the saving shows. One owner who moved from baseboards reports a heating bill 83% lower in the first month. He plans to post more data after another billing cycle, so treat one month as a first look.
• Thermostat settings matter. An Ontario owner with dual fuel says his unit never shut off after big setbacks while the house was empty, which cost him during the highest time-of-use rates. He now lets gas cover large temperature gaps and avoids deep setbacks. A Toronto owner plans to hold 21 °C and leave it there, because raising the temperature quickly keeps the heat pump running all day.
• Installers can resist. The southern Alberta owner says his contractor disliked heat pumps. He sized the system with a building consultant and pushed the contractor to install it. Ask how many heat pumps an installer has put in.
• Experiences vary. One owner calls a system with two compressors and five indoor units a $20,000 mistake after repeated leak repairs. Others call their outdoor units very quiet, although noise is the most common drawback in the survey below.

The survey. Clean Energy Canada ran a survey with Summerhill Group. It collected 3,797 responses between November 1, 2025 and February 16, 2026. Owners were recruited through utilities, incentive agencies, social media and newsletters, the results are not weighted, and most responses came from Ontario. Of the owners who answered, 91% would recommend a heat pump, 56% said their energy bill was lower after installing it, and 3% said they were disappointed in the savings or saw bills rise. Read it as owners’ sentiment and not as measured savings. One commenter in the 2026 thread questions its methodology because, in his words, advocacy groups ran it.

Downsides of a heat pump and when to think twice

1. Higher up-front cost. Owners report paying $10,000 or more in most cold-climate ducted installations (65% in the survey), before incentives.
2. Output varies by model in the cold. NRCan lists minimum operating temperatures of −15 to −25 °C for recent models, so you need backup for the coldest days.
3. Backup heat raises the bill. Electric resistance backup delivers less heat per unit of electricity than a heat pump, and owners report it switching on more than they expected.
4. Electrical work. A panel upgrade can add $1,000–$10,000 according to Green Building Canada; one Ontario owner paid about $2,000.
5. Ducts. Duct repairs or changes can add $1,000–$5,000.
6. Noise and upkeep. In the survey, 16% of owners said the system was noisier than they would like and 9% said it needed more maintenance than they would like.

Think twice if your gas furnace is recent and efficient and your air conditioner still works (one owner in the 2026 thread kept a working air conditioner for exactly that reason), if your electrical panel needs an upgrade, or if the installers near you rarely install heat pumps.

What to check on a heat pump quote

1. Output in the cold. Ask for the heating output at your design temperature, in writing.
2. Backup. Ask what backup the quote includes and at what outdoor temperature it starts.
3. Ratings. Ask for the HSPF2 and SEER2 of the model; our guide explains what HSPF2 and SEER2 mean.
4. Electrical work. Ask whether the price covers a panel upgrade and a dedicated circuit.
5. Ducts. Ask whether your existing ducts suit the unit or need changes, and who pays for them.
6. Permit and removal. Ask whether the price includes the permit and the removal of the old equipment. EcoFrost’s guide says its prices include both, but that statement covers all its work and the page gives no detail for heat pumps.
7. Running cost. Ask the installer to estimate it from your own gas and electricity bills, using the method above.
8. Your furnace. If you keep your furnace, see our furnace cost in Canada ranges to compare a dual-fuel system with replacing it.

Frequently asked questions

Why is my bill so high with a heat pump?

Backup heat is the usual cause. Below the temperature range of your heat pump, backup heating takes over, and NRCan says a heat pump delivers up to twice the heat per unit of electricity that electric resistance does. Owners also report that deep thermostat setbacks send the system into catch-up mode. Ask your installer at what outdoor temperature backup starts, and check your thermostat’s backup setting.

Is it okay for a heat pump to run all night in winter?

Owners describe long run times as normal: they call the heat steady and low compared with a furnace’s on-off blasts. Cost climbs when the system has to recover from a deep setback. One Ontario dual-fuel owner says his unit never shut off after big setbacks until he limited them and let gas cover large gaps. We found no NRCan guidance on setbacks, so ask your installer which setting suits your model.