If you want to know how much doctors make in Canada, start with take-home pay, not billings. A family physician working full time typically takes home about $150,000 to $165,000 annually, after overhead and personal income tax. In higher-billing, lower-tax provinces such as Alberta, take-home can reach roughly $180,000. That is well below the gross billing numbers that make headlines.
Take-home pay also shifts by province. It tends to run higher in Alberta, where billings are strong and tax rates are lower. It runs a little lower in Ontario, British Columbia (B.C.), and Quebec, where top tax rates are higher.
These are estimates, not paycheques. Most Canadian doctors are not salaried employees.
Instead, they bill a provincial health plan and run a small business. They pay overhead out of what they bill. Then they pay personal or corporate tax on what is left.
To see what a doctor really earns, follow the money from gross billings down to after-tax income.
Why billings are not the same as salary
A common misunderstanding about doctor pay is treating billings as salary. The two are not the same thing. Sorting this out is the key to how much doctors make in Canada.
In 2023–24, the average gross clinical payment per physician in Canada was about $383,000. That figure comes from the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI). CIHI is explicit that these are gross amounts.
In most cases, the gross figure still includes the cost of running a practice. That covers staff salaries, rent, equipment, and supplies.
Most physicians are paid through fee-for-service. They bill the provincial or territorial health plan for each service they provide. In 2023–24, fee-for-service made up about 72% of gross clinical payments, according to CIHI. Alternative payment plans, such as salary-like or capitation arrangements, made up the other 28%.
Under fee-for-service, a doctor is effectively a self-employed small-business owner. The difference is that they have one main payer.
From billings to take-home pay
Turning billings into take-home pay involves four steps.
Gross billings: the total a physician bills the provincial plan.
Overhead: the cost of running the practice, including staff, rent, equipment, supplies, professional fees, and insurance.
Net (pre-tax) income: what is left after overhead.
After-tax income: what remains once personal or corporate income tax is paid.
Overhead is significant. A 2017 Canadian Medical Association (CMA) survey put family physician overhead at roughly 28% of income. The College of Family Physicians of Canada cites that figure and notes that inflation has pushed those costs higher since.
Across all physicians, overhead commonly runs around 30% of gross billings, according to the CMA. It can reach 50% or more, depending on specialty and practice model.
Here is an illustrative example. Take a family physician in Ontario billing about $340,000 in 1 year. Subtract roughly 30% overhead, and net income is about $238,000. Apply personal income tax at an average rate, not the top marginal rate. After-tax take-home then lands near $150,000 to $165,000.
Change the province, the overhead rate, or the tax structure, and the final number moves. The steps don't change, though: start with billings, subtract overhead, then subtract tax.
Doctor pay by province
Gross clinical payments vary by province and specialties. For family medicine, average gross clinical payments per full-time equivalent (FTE) physician in 2023–24 looked like this:
Province | Family medicine (gross, per FTE) |
|---|---|
| Ontario | $341,645 |
| British Columbia | $366,972 |
| Quebec | $392,508 |
| Alberta | $414,067 |
| National average | $368,895 |
Remember that these are gross figures, before overhead and tax.
Doctor pay by specialty
Specialty is a major driver of gross billings. The figures below are average gross clinical payments per FTE physician in 2023–24, again before overhead and tax:
Specialty | National average | Ontario | B.C. | Alberta | Quebec |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Family medicine | $368,895 | $341,645 | $366,972 | $414,067 | $392,508 |
| Psychiatry | $345,129 | $317,502 | $377,408 | $353,218 | $342,804 |
| Internal medicine | $489,324 | $469,786 | $557,080 | $540,237 | $478,416 |
| General surgery | $571,042 | $522,537 | $576,224 | $662,993 | $619,265 |
| Cardiology | $566,810 | $545,042 | $664,214 | $682,234 | $526,878 |
| Ophthalmology | $907,381 | $783,745 | $1,015,590 | $1,389,676 | $729,798 |
Higher-billing specialties, such as ophthalmology and some surgical fields, also tend to carry higher overhead. So the gap in take-home pay is narrower than the gap in gross billings suggests.
What doctors pay in tax, and why many incorporate
Because most physicians are self-employed, they pay tax on net income. Tax is not withheld from a salary for them.
To manage that burden, many doctors set up a medical professional corporation. Income left inside the corporation is taxed at the small-business rate, which is much lower than top personal rates. The doctor pays personal tax only when they take money out as salary or dividends. That lets them defer tax on money they don't need yet. It also lets them even out their personal income. They can pay themselves a similar amount each year, leaving extra in the corporation in high-billing years and drawing more in leaner ones, such as a parental leave or early retirement. A steadier income keeps more of it out of the top tax brackets.