About What's the rate?
A quick way to compare the mortgage rates Canadian lenders advertise, with calculators and plain-language explanations to help you understand them.
Where the rates come from
Every hour, this site reads the mortgage rates each lender publishes on its own website and shows them side by side. Each lender's name in the rates table links to the page its rates came from.
Eight lenders (BMO, CIBC, Simplii Financial, Vancity, Meridian, Beem Credit Union, National Bank and PC Financial) block automated visits to some of their rates pages, or draw their rates with a script, so those rates are read from the lenders' pages three times a day instead: in the morning, at midday and in the evening (Toronto time). Simplii Financial's GIC and savings rates are still read every hour, from the data file its own rates pages use.
- Loading the list of lenders…
Where a lender lists both posted and special-offer rates, the table shows the special-offer rate. When a lender only lists posted rates, or a rate for a particular group of borrowers, a note under the rate says so.
When a rate can't be collected
Lenders change their websites from time to time. If a rate can't be read in an update, the table keeps showing the last rate collected but marks it "Not refreshed", so an old rate is never presented as current. Rates are never estimated or filled in by guesswork. For the lenders read three times a day, a rate that hasn't been checked for more than a week is also marked "Not refreshed".
Bank of Canada figures
The policy interest rate and the prime rate come from the Bank of Canada's official data service. The prime rate shown is the typical rate of Canada's major banks; each lender sets its own.
Rate history and arrows
Once a day the site saves every lender's rates. The rate history charts show how they've moved, and the small arrows in the rates table show how much a rate has changed in the last 7 days.
Rate alerts
If you'd like to know when a lender changes its rates without checking back, you can follow the site's rate-change feed in any feed reader app (sometimes called an RSS reader). Its address is https://whatstherate.ca/feed.xml, and the rate alerts page shows how to add it and the latest changes. It's optional, free and needs no sign-up.
Calculators and Rates Explained
The calculators and Rates Explained guides follow the rules published by CMHC, the Department of Finance Canada, the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada, provincial governments and federal law. Each page links to its official sources. Results are estimates to help you plan, not offers or advice.
How this site is paid for
The rates, calculators and Rates Explained courses are free, with no ads and no tracking. The site is paid for by the reports and workbooks in the Shop. No lender pays to be listed or to rank higher: lenders are sorted by their rates.
Your rate may be different
The rates here are the ones lenders advertise to everyone. The rate you're offered depends on your situation, and many banks offer existing clients lower rates through relationship pricing. Always confirm the current rate and terms with the lender before you decide.