Visitor visa document checklist
Quick answer
A visitor visa application generally needs identity documents, evidence of the purpose and length of your visit, proof that you can pay for the trip, and evidence of ties that support your return. Most refusals rest on purpose of visit, funds or ties rather than on a missing form.
Create my checklist
Tick whatever is true of you and the situation-dependent items narrow to your circumstances. Nothing is sent anywhere and no contact details are needed.
Generally required
- Valid passportBiographical pages, and every page containing a stamp or visa.
- Digital photo meeting IRCC specifications
- Proof of current immigration statusWhere you are living outside your country of citizenship.
Program-specific
- Travel itinerary or planned dates of travel
- Proof of funds for the visitBank statements covering a settled period, not a single recent deposit.
- Letter of invitation, where someone in Canada is hosting you
- Evidence of ties to your home countryEmployment, property, studies, family responsibilities.
- Purpose-of-visit letter
Situation-dependent
- Employer letter confirming employment and approved leave
- Business registration and income documents
- Documents for accompanying dependent children
- Spouse's documents where travelling together
- Current Canadian status documents for an extension
- Explanation addressing a previous refusal
May be requested
- Police certificate
- Immigration medical examination for longer stays
- Additional proof of the host's status in Canada
Where applications most often go wrong
- • A purpose-of-visit letter that does not match the itinerary or the funds
- • Funds deposited shortly before applying with no explanation of their source
- • Omitting a previous refusal that IRCC already has on record
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Copy a plain-text summary with the estimate disclaimer and the official source attached.
This checklist is a preparation aid. The document requirements that govern your application are those on the official IRCC document checklist generated for that application at the time you submit it.
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