Insurance for parents visiting Canada: super visa or visitor visa?

Choose the super visa if your parent will stay more than six months or return more than once and your household income clears LICO ($38,002 for two people, $56,724 for four, from 29 July 2025). It requires a paid $100,000 one-year policy, but IRCC approves 75 to 81% of applications and grants five years per entry. Choose an ordinary visitor visa for a single short trip: no insurance is needed to apply, but approval runs about 50%, the stay is six months, and an uninsured parent is billed $3,750 to $4,005 a day on an Ontario ward.

Which route should you choose?

Pick by three facts: how long the parent wants to stay, how often they will come, and whether your income meets the LICO table. If any answer is “more than six months”, “every year” or “yes”, the super visa is the better file. If the answers are “a few weeks”, “once” and “not this year”, apply for a visitor visa and buy a visitors to Canada plan before the flight.

Sources: IRCC eligibility, IRCC officer instructions, Go Far Global, Immigration.ca.

Why does the super visa get approved more often?

Because the file answers the officer’s main question in advance. A visitor visa officer has to guess whether the parent will leave and whether they can afford to be here. A super visa file contains the host’s tax assessment against LICO, a paid $100,000 policy, and a medical exam, which together remove the cost-to-Canada concern.

The volume shows the trend. IRCC approved 17,335 super visas in 2019, 73,604 in 2023, 53,695 in 2024 and about 41,400 in the first nine months of 2025, roughly 360,000 since 2011 (IRCC report to Parliament). India accounts for 56% of them, China 11%, Pakistan 5% and the Philippines 4%. Visitor visa approvals fell to about half of applications in 2025 and recovered only to 52% in early 2026.

What does each route cost?

The super visa route costs about $2,200 to $3,300 in year one for a 65-year-old, nearly all of it the policy. The visitor route costs about $185 in fees plus a shorter policy, which for a six-month stay at the same age runs about $1,000 to $1,600. Over three years of annual visits, the super visa is cheaper because the visa fee is paid once.

Annual premium, $100,000 coverage, $0 deductible, rates seen Oct 2026 — verify at quote time. Sources: BestQuote, PolicyAdvisor. Six-month figures are the annual rate halved, since visitor plans are priced per day. Lowest of the six carriers compared on 17 October 2026 for a 65-year-old with stable pre-existing conditions: Secure Travel at $2,051. Monthly instalments with a deposit are accepted by IRCC; see monthly plans.

How does timing differ?

A super visa takes 44 to 97 days from the main source countries plus the medical and biometrics, so plan three to five months from decision to arrival. A visitor visa is often faster, but the time saved is lost if it is refused and the family then starts the super visa file anyway.

The policy start date is the one timing decision that costs money if wrong. Every super visa carrier lets the start date be moved before coverage begins, and India’s processing time went from 208 days in March 2026 to 70 days in September. Buy the policy when the application is submitted, set the start date to the hoped-for flight, and move it when the passport comes back.

What does the 2026 PGP pause change?

It removes the permanent residence route for new applicants. On 15 July 2026 IRCC paused new Parents and Grandparents Program intake until further notice and capped admissions at 15,000 a year for 2026 to 2028. Families that were waiting for an invitation to sponsor now have the super visa as the only long-stay option.

The notice itself says so, pointing to the super visa’s five-year stays and the 2025 and 2026 easing of the insurance and income rules. For a parent who was going to come on a visitor visa while the PGP file progressed, the calculation has changed: the super visa is now the destination, not the bridge, and it is worth building the file properly the first time. The super visa hub walks through it.

What happens if an uninsured parent gets sick?

The hospital treats them and bills them at the non-resident rate, and the bill follows the family. Ontario hospitals publish these rates. Niagara Health charges non-residents $3,750 a day on an acute ward, $4,500 a day in ICU or CCU and $850 per emergency visit from 1 July 2026, with physician fees billed separately and due before treatment. Queensway Carleton Hospital in Ottawa charges $4,005 a day on a ward, $15,642 a day in intensive care and $1,242 per emergency visit from 1 April 2026.

Physician fees are extra at both. A ten-day ward stay is $37,500 to $40,050 before doctors; a week in intensive care at Queensway Carleton is $109,494. The Hamilton case in CP24 reached $96,311 in under three weeks with ventilation. Hospitals pursue the patient and, in practice, the host who signed as guarantor at admission.

Insurance is therefore not a visa formality but the thing that stops a visit becoming a mortgage. A visitor plan bought before arrival has no waiting period; one bought after arrival carries 48 hours to 7 days for illness. Compare visitor plans on the visitors to Canada page.

The income rule, and what changed in March 2026

The host must meet the minimum necessary income (LICO) for their household size, counting themselves, their spouse, dependants, any previously sponsored people still under undertaking, and the visiting parents. From 29 July 2025 the thresholds are $30,526 for one person, $38,002 for two, $46,720 for three, $56,724 for four, $64,336 for five, $72,560 for six, $80,784 for seven and $8,224 for each additional person.

From 31 March 2026, IRCC’s notice allows the host to use either of the two preceding tax years. It also allows a second path: the host and a co-signing spouse or partner meet 75% of LICO, with the parent’s own income covering up to 25%. A sibling cannot co-sign. Hosts who narrowly missed LICO on last year’s return should re-check against the year before.

Decision summary

Super visa if: stay over six months, repeat visits, income at or above LICO, parent willing to do a medical exam, and the family can pay $1,400 to $3,100 for a one-year policy. Visitor visa if: a single trip of a few weeks, income below LICO with no co-signer, or the parent is visa-exempt and only wants a short stay on an eTA. In both cases buy the policy before the flight.

SuperVisaDirect is operated by Super Visa Direct Insurance Services, an independent Ontario life and accident-and-sickness insurance agency licensed by FSRA (licence [FSRA-LICENCE]), serving Ontario residents; other provinces are coming in 2028. Get a super visa quote or a visitor plan quote, and if your parent is applying from a particular country, start with the page for India, Pakistan, the Philippines, Nigeria, the UK or the UAE.