How long each mode takes, which ports to use, every charge that goes into the cost, the duty, GST and surtaxes paid at the border, and the order to do things in so the goods are not held.
Ocean freight from China to Canada takes about 20 to 28 days door to door to Vancouver or Prince Rupert and about 30 to 40 days to Toronto or Montreal, while air freight takes about 8 to 12 days. The cost is a stack of charges: origin, ocean freight, destination terminal, inland rail, customs brokerage, duty, 5% GST and delivery. Duty depends on the goods’ HS code, and some Chinese steel and aluminum products carry a 25% surtax. Buy FOB rather than DDP, register in CARM, and classify the goods before you order.
Written by Aleksandrs Smetanins, President, Qeep Logistics · Last reviewed November 5, 2026
The crossing itself is the predictable part. Most of the variation comes from what happens on either side of it: how long the factory takes to have the goods ready, how long a consolidated LCL box waits to fill, how long the container sits at the port before it gets on a train, and whether customs asks to examine it.
These are door-to-door planning times from a factory near a major Chinese port to a business in Canada.
| Mode | To Vancouver or Prince Rupert | To Toronto or Montreal | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ocean FCL | About 20 to 28 days | About 30 to 40 days | Full containers, lowest cost per unit |
| Ocean LCL | About 26 to 38 days | Longer, plus the rail leg | Roughly 1 to 9 pallets |
| Air freight | About 8 to 12 days | About 8 to 12 days | Urgent, seasonal or high-value cargo |
Planning estimates, not guarantees. Add one to three weeks around Chinese New Year (6 February 2027) and the October 1 to 7 Golden Week, when factories and trucking in China slow or close. Rail dwell at the West Coast ports and customs examinations can add several days.
Pick the mode, the Chinese port and where the goods are going in Canada. The estimate includes origin handling, the crossing, clearance and delivery, and the quote button carries your lane into the form.
Door-to-door planning estimate from cargo-ready to delivered. Actual transit depends on sailing schedules, customs exam selection, port congestion and final-mile distance.
On the Chinese side, most cargo leaves from Shanghai, Ningbo, Shenzhen (Yantian and Shekou) or Qingdao. Your supplier's location usually decides the port, and a factory far inland adds a few days of trucking or rail to reach it.
On the Canadian side, Vancouver handles the most Asian cargo and has the most sailings. Prince Rupert is the closest major North American port to Asia and connects straight onto CN rail. Containers for Ontario and Quebec usually land on the West Coast and continue by intermodal rail to Toronto or Montreal, where they are picked up from the rail ramp by container drayage. Montreal is also served directly by ocean, with a longer voyage from Asia.
If the cargo is going a long way inland, it is often transloaded at the port into a 53-foot trailer, which returns the empty container sooner and moves the freight as a regular truckload.
There is no honest fixed price for this lane. Pacific ocean rates move every week with fuel, carrier capacity and the season, and a container rate that was right two months ago can be out by thousands of dollars today. Any price you see published is a snapshot of one week. So we quote each shipment on the day, with every charge named and the date the rate holds until. Send the origin city, the destination and what you are shipping, and an all-in quote comes back in under an hour.
Everything except the freight rate can be worked out before you ask. The total landed cost is a stack of separate charges, and quotes that look cheap usually leave some of them out. Which ones you pay depends on the Incoterm you agreed with your supplier.
| Charge | What it covers | How it is priced |
|---|---|---|
| Origin charges | Pickup at the factory, export clearance, Chinese terminal handling | Per shipment. Paid by the supplier on FOB. |
| Ocean freight | The Pacific crossing, plus fuel and peak-season surcharges | Per container for FCL, per cubic metre for LCL. Changes weekly. |
| Air freight | The flight to a Canadian airport | Per chargeable kg, the greater of actual and volume weight |
| Destination charges | Canadian terminal handling, delivery order, LCL deconsolidation | Per container or per shipment |
| Inland rail | Port to the Toronto, Montreal or Calgary rail ramp | Per container |
| Customs brokerage | Classification, entry filing in CARM, release | Per entry |
| Duty and GST | Duty by HS code, then 5% GST on value plus duty | Percentage of the value for duty |
| Delivery | Drayage or truck from the port or ramp to your door | Per move. Waiting time is billed by the hour. |
Avoidable extras are usually storage and demurrage when a container is not picked up on time, exam fees if customs inspects the box, and chassis charges. Ask for a quote that names every line and the date the ocean rate is valid until.
Duty and GST follow fixed rules, so they can be calculated to the dollar before the goods ship. Here is a shipment of goods bought FOB Ningbo for CAD $40,000, with an example duty rate of 6.5%.
| Line | How it is worked out | Amount (CAD) |
|---|---|---|
| Value for duty | Price at the Chinese port of loading. Ocean freight is not added. | $40,000 |
| Duty | 6.5% of the value for duty | $2,600 |
| GST | 5% of the value plus the duty ($42,600) | $2,130 |
| Freight, terminal, rail, brokerage, delivery | From your quote on the day | Quoted |
| Landed cost | Goods, duty and GST, plus the quoted freight | $44,730 + freight |
The 6.5% rate is an example only. Your rate comes from the goods' HS code and can be zero or higher, and any surtax or anti-dumping duty is added on top. A GST-registered importer can usually claim the GST back as an input tax credit, which is one more reason to import in your own name rather than buy DDP.
Air is billed on the greater of actual weight and volume weight, which is length × width × height in centimetres divided by 6,000. One cubic metre counts as about 167 kg, so a 120 × 100 × 150 cm pallet weighing 200 kg is billed as 300 kg. The dimensional weight calculator works it out.
LCL is billed per weight or measure: cubic metres or metric tonnes, whichever is greater. A 4 m³ shipment weighing 1,500 kg is billed as 4. Most LCL quotes also have a minimum of one cubic metre.
A full container is one price whatever is inside, up to the weight limit. Once LCL passes roughly 9 pallets, a 20ft box usually costs less per unit.
The season (August to October and the weeks before Chinese New Year run highest), the container size, the origin port, and how far inland the box goes after the port. Rail to Toronto is a separate line from the ocean rate.
Enter the invoice value of the goods and the duty rate from your tariff classification. The rate is not guessed for you: duty depends on the HS code and the origin, and getting that wrong is what triggers a reassessment.
Enter a goods value to see the numbers.
Commercial imports. GST is charged on the duty-paid value, and a GST registrant normally recovers it as an input tax credit. The provincial portion of HST is generally not collected at the border on commercial goods. Excise duty, SIMA duty and other levies are not included. This is an estimate to plan with, not a customs entry: a licensed customs broker files the entry and confirms the classification. How we handle customs.
Duty depends on the goods, not the country alone. Every product has an HS tariff classification, and goods of Chinese origin get Canada's Most-Favoured-Nation rate for that code. Many industrial goods are duty-free, while clothing, footwear and some consumer goods carry rates up to 18%. GST of 5% is then charged on the value plus the duty.
Canada works out duty on the price at the place of direct shipment, normally the Chinese port of loading, so the ocean freight is not part of the value for duty. The import duty calculator shows how duty and GST stack on a real shipment.
Courier shipments from China valued at CAD $20 or less enter free of duty and tax. The higher $150 and $40 thresholds people quote online apply only to goods from the US and Mexico.
The 100% surtax on Chinese-made electric vehicles was repealed on March 1, 2026. EVs now pay the regular 6.1% rate under a yearly import quota agreed with China in January 2026.
A 25% surtax under the China Surtax Order (2024) still applies to certain steel and aluminum products from China. Some products in short supply have remission through the end of 2026.
Steel goods from other countries that contain steel melted and poured in China can also attract a surtax. Ask the supplier for a mill certificate showing where the steel was melted.
Specific Chinese products, from fasteners to steel pipe, carry anti-dumping or countervailing duties on top of everything else. Check your HS code before you place the order, not after the goods arrive.
Most problems with a first import from China come from steps done out of order: buying on the wrong Incoterm, or finding out about a surtax when the goods are already at sea. This is the order that avoids them.
Register a business number with an RM import-export account from the CRA. It is free and takes minutes online.
Set up the CBSA's CARM Client Portal, delegate access to your customs broker, and post financial security if you want goods released before you pay.
Find the HS code and check the duty rate, any surtax and any anti-dumping duty before you agree a price with the supplier.
Buy FOB or DAP, not DDP, so you are the importer of record and can claim back the GST. The Incoterms chart shows who pays for what.
Choose FCL, LCL or air, book with the factory's ready date in mind, and confirm wood packaging is ISPM 15 treated and marked.
Get the commercial invoice, packing list and bill of lading to your broker before the ship arrives.
The broker files the entry, CBSA releases the goods, and duty and GST are paid through CARM.
The container is picked up from the port or rail ramp, unloaded at your dock, and the empty returned before demurrage starts.
We run the whole move on one file from Toronto: pickup and export at origin through our partners in China, the ocean or air booking, the customs entry filed by our partner licensed brokers and coordinated by us, rail, drayage and delivery to your door. You get one landed-cost quote, usually in under an hour, and one contact from quote to proof of delivery, with dispatch watching the shipment 24/7.
See the China to Canada freight service for the routings we run and a transit estimator for your lane.
Door to door from the factory in China to your dock in Canada, on one file.
Read more →FCL and LCL containers into Vancouver, Prince Rupert and Montreal.
Read more →Urgent and high-value cargo from Chinese airports to Canada.
Read more →Entries filed by our partner licensed brokers, coordinated by us.
Read more →How duty and GST stack, and the real landed cost of a shipment.
Read more →Containers moved from the port or rail ramp to your dock.
Read more →Door to door, ocean FCL to the West Coast (Vancouver or Prince Rupert) takes about 20 to 28 days. Add rail or an East Coast routing and Toronto or Montreal is about 30 to 40 days. LCL adds consolidation time, so plan on 26 to 38 days. Air freight is about 8 to 12 days door to door. Chinese New Year and the October Golden Week add one to three weeks if your goods are not ready before the factories close.
Ocean rates on the Pacific change week to week, so any container price you see online is a snapshot of one week, and we quote each shipment on the day instead, usually in under an hour. The ocean rate is also only one part of the cost. A container price is made up of origin charges, the ocean freight and its surcharges, destination terminal charges, rail if the box is going inland, customs brokerage, duty, GST and the truck to your door. Ask for a quote that names every charge and the date it is valid until.
Usually, yes. Duty is set by the goods' HS tariff classification, and goods of Chinese origin get Canada's Most-Favoured-Nation rate, which is zero for many products and higher for others such as clothing and footwear. GST of 5% is then charged on the value plus the duty. Some steel and aluminum products from China also carry a 25% surtax, and anti-dumping duties apply to specific goods. Courier shipments valued at CAD $20 or less enter free of duty and tax.
Yes. Ocean and air freight from China to Canada run normally. The trade measures of 2024 to 2026 targeted specific products, mainly electric vehicles, steel and aluminum, not trade as a whole. The 100% surtax on Chinese electric vehicles was repealed on March 1, 2026. The 25% surtax on certain Chinese steel and aluminum products remains, with remission for some products.
For anything over a few pallets, sea freight is far cheaper than air. LCL, where you share a container, suits roughly 1 to 9 pallets. Above that, a 20ft container usually costs less per unit, and a 40ft or 40ft high cube is the lowest cost per cubic metre. Air and express courier only make sense for small, urgent or high-value shipments, because they are priced per chargeable kilogram.
Air freight and courier are priced per chargeable kilogram: the greater of the actual weight and the volume weight, which for air is length × width × height in centimetres divided by 6,000. One cubic metre counts as about 167 kg, so light, bulky cargo is billed on its size. Sea freight is not priced per kg. LCL is priced per cubic metre or tonne, whichever is greater, and FCL per container.
Vancouver handles the most Asian cargo and has the most sailings. Prince Rupert is the closest major North American port to Asia and connects straight onto CN rail to Toronto and the Midwest. Montreal suits Quebec and eastern Ontario but has a longer ocean voyage from Asia. For Toronto, the usual routing is a West Coast port and then rail.
Usually not. DDP makes the seller the importer of record, and almost no Chinese factory has a Canadian business number or CARM registration. An agent's number gets used instead, you stay jointly liable for the duty, and because the entry is not in your name you cannot claim the GST back. Buy FOB or DAP and import in your own name.
There is no single rate. You pay duty at the rate for the goods' HS code, which ranges from zero to 18% for most consumer and industrial goods, plus 5% GST on the value and the duty. Provincial sales tax is accounted for separately by registered businesses. Surtaxes and anti-dumping duties apply on top for specific products.
It is not legally required, but most businesses use one. The broker classifies the goods, files the entry in the CARM Client Portal and pays the duty and GST through their account or yours. Mistakes in classification or value can be reassessed for up to four years, so the filing is worth getting right the first time.
Tell us the origin, destination and mode. A Qeep specialist replies within the hour with live capacity, lane price, and a transit window you can actually plan around.