immigration
BC PNP 2025 Statistical Report: Healthcare Rises as Tech Nominations Decline
On August 26, 2026, the Government of British Columbia released the BC PNP Statistical Report and Year in Review 2025 , providing a detailed look at how the province used its immig
The report covers nomination numbers, occupations, salaries, countries of origin, and the regional distribution of nominees across British Columbia. More importantly, it provides insight into how the province is prioritizing limited immigration spaces.
The clearest takeaway from the 2025 report is that the BC Provincial Nominee Program is becoming increasingly selective.
With fewer nomination spaces available, British Columbia placed greater emphasis on healthcare professionals, highly skilled and highly paid workers, and candidates who could contribute to communities outside Metro Vancouver.
BC PNP Nomination Allocation Fell Sharply in 2025
In 2024, British Columbia received an allocation of 8,000 provincial nominations.For 2025, however, the federal government initially reduced the province's allocation to just 4,000 nominations, cutting the available spaces in half.
This created an immediate challenge for the BC PNP.
At the beginning of 2025, the program already had approximately 5,200 applications in its inventory, meaning the number of existing applications alone exceeded the province's initial nomination allocation.
As a result, British Columbia significantly limited the number of new applications it accepted during the year.
The province also paused or restricted processing in certain areas, while focusing its limited nomination spaces primarily on healthcare workers and candidates considered to have a high economic impact.
Later in the year, the federal government provided British Columbia with additional nomination spaces, bringing the province's final allocation to 6,214 nominations.
British Columbia ultimately used its entire allocation.
| Category | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|
| Total BC PNP nominations | 8,000 | 6,214 |
| Skills Immigration | 7,972 | 6,195 |
| Entrepreneur Immigration | 28 | 19 |
Healthcare Became One of the BC PNP's Top Priorities
One of the most significant changes in the 2025 report is the growing importance of healthcare occupations.Healthcare workers represented approximately 7.2% of Skills Immigration nominees in 2023.
That share increased to 12.1% in 2024 and then rose sharply to 20.2% in 2025.
The number of healthcare professionals working for public health authorities who received BC PNP nominations also increased considerably.
In 2024, 675 healthcare professionals working within public health organizations were nominated.
By 2025, that number had increased to 1,241, representing an increase of approximately 84%.
This is particularly notable because the province's overall nomination allocation decreased during the same period.
Among clinical healthcare occupations nominated in 2025 were approximately 218 physicians and 652 registered nurses and nurse practitioners.
The numbers clearly demonstrate how the BC PNP is being used as part of British Columbia's broader strategy to address healthcare workforce shortages.
In other words, provincial immigration policy is increasingly functioning not only as an immigration program, but also as a labour-market tool.
Tech Nominations Continued to Decline
For many years, technology was one of the most prominent sectors associated with the BC PNP.Since the introduction of the BC PNP Tech Pilot in 2017, thousands of technology professionals have received provincial nominations.
By 2025, a total of approximately 13,868 tech workers had been nominated through BC PNP technology initiatives.
However, recent numbers show a significant decline.
Priority technology occupation nominations decreased from approximately 2,490 in 2023 to 1,302 in 2024, and then to just 607 in 2025.
The share of technology workers among Skills Immigration nominees also declined significantly.
In 2023, tech workers represented approximately 30.4% of Skills Immigration nominations.
That figure dropped to 16.3% in 2024 and then to only 9.8% in 2025.
This does not necessarily mean that British Columbia no longer needs technology professionals.
Instead, it reflects a broader shift in how the province evaluates candidates.
Rather than prioritizing technology workers simply because they work in a designated occupation, the province increasingly appears to be focusing on candidates who demonstrate greater overall economic impact.
High Economic Impact Becomes More Important
One of the most important concepts in the 2025 BC PNP strategy is High Economic Impact, or HEI.Under this approach, the province prioritizes workers who earn relatively high wages or achieve strong BC PNP registration scores.
This means that occupation alone may no longer be enough to make a candidate competitive.
Salary, skill level, professional experience, occupation, and overall contribution to British Columbia's economy are becoming increasingly important factors.
The decline in dedicated tech nominations should therefore be viewed within this broader policy shift.
Highly skilled technology professionals may still be competitive, particularly if they have strong salaries and profiles.
However, being employed in a technology occupation by itself appears to carry less weight than it did several years ago.
BC PNP Nominee Salaries Increased Significantly
The shift toward high-skilled and high-economic-impact workers is also visible in nominee salary data.In 2025, excluding the International Post-Graduate category, Skills Immigration nominees had an average annual salary of approximately $110,236 and a median salary of $80,769.
Skilled Worker nominees had particularly high salaries.
Their median annual salary reached approximately $105,000, while the average was approximately $125,251.
| Stream | Average Salary | Median Salary |
|---|---|---|
| Skilled Worker | $125,251 | $105,000 |
| Health Authority | $115,243 | $80,769 |
| International Graduate | $60,699 | $57,200 |
| Entry Level and Semi-Skilled | $44,722 | $42,685 |
| Overall, excluding IPG | $110,236 | $80,769 |
The median hourly wage of Skills Immigration nominees also reached approximately $41.42.
By comparison, the median hourly wage for workers across British Columbia during the same period was approximately $32.49.
The difference suggests that the BC PNP is increasingly selecting workers who occupy higher-paying and more specialized positions.
The province attributed part of this increase to its focus on high-economic-impact candidates, as well as the growing number of physicians, nurses, and other highly paid healthcare professionals receiving nominations.
For future applicants, this trend is important.
Having a qualifying job may no longer be enough on its own.
Salary level and the economic value of the position are becoming increasingly important components of a competitive BC PNP profile.
Regional Immigration Remains an Important Priority
Another long-standing goal of the BC PNP is encouraging immigration outside Metro Vancouver.In 2025, approximately 38% of Skills Immigration nominees lived and worked outside Metro Vancouver.
This exceeded the province's target of at least 35%.
Regional distribution also shows that immigrants continued to settle across multiple parts of the province.
Approximately 4,018 Skills Immigration nominees were located in the Mainland/Southwest region, accounting for about 64.9% of the total.
Around 964 nominees, or 15.6%, were located in the Vancouver Island/Coast region.
The Thompson/Okanagan and Kootenay regions accounted for approximately 756 nominees, while northern regions accounted for roughly 457.
Within Metro Vancouver, Vancouver remained the largest destination, followed by Burnaby, Surrey, and Richmond.
This regional distribution helps explain why the BC PNP continues to provide additional registration points for employment outside the Metro Vancouver Regional District.
The province is attempting to direct immigration toward communities experiencing labour shortages while reducing the concentration of newcomers in the Lower Mainland.
India Remained the Largest Source Country
The report also provides insight into the countries and regions of origin of BC PNP nominees.In 2025, approximately 63.2% of Skills Immigration nominees came from East and Southeast Asia or South and Central Asia.
The top five countries of origin were:
1. India
2. China
3. Iran
4. The Philippines
5. The United States
The appearance of the United States among the top five is particularly notable.
British Columbia has actively recruited healthcare professionals from countries such as the United States and the United Kingdom as part of its strategy to address healthcare workforce shortages.
According to the report, nominations of physicians from the United States increased by approximately 290% compared with the previous year, while nominations of registered nurses from the United States increased by approximately 208%.
The number of healthcare professionals arriving from the United Kingdom also increased.
These figures demonstrate that the BC PNP is not only being used to transition temporary residents who are already working in British Columbia into permanent residence.
It is also increasingly being used as an international recruitment tool for occupations where the province faces significant labour shortages.
What the 2025 BC PNP Report Tells Us
At first glance, the decline in BC PNP nominations from 8,000 in 2024 to 6,214 in 2025 may make the program appear to be simply shrinking.But the detailed data tells a more complicated story.
British Columbia is becoming significantly more strategic in how it uses its limited nomination allocation.
Healthcare professionals, highly skilled workers, high-wage earners, and candidates contributing to regional labour markets are receiving greater attention.
At the same time, the decline in dedicated technology nominations and the emergence of the High Economic Impact approach suggest that the province is gradually moving away from broad occupation-based prioritization.
Instead, candidates are increasingly being assessed based on a combination of factors, including:
- occupation and labour-market demand,
- salary,
- skill level,
- location of employment, and
- overall economic contribution to British Columbia.
For prospective BC PNP applicants, this represents an important change in strategy.
The key question is no longer simply:
“Is my occupation eligible for the BC PNP?”
Applicants may increasingly need to ask:
“How competitive is my overall profile, and how closely does my employment align with British Columbia's current economic and labour-market priorities?”
The 2025 BC PNP Statistical Report suggests that the program is evolving into a more targeted economic immigration system—one that uses a limited number of nominations to select workers the province considers most important to its healthcare system, economy, and regional workforce needs.