Income Percentiles in Ottawa: Where Your Income Ranks

The federal public service is Ottawa’s largest employer, and its pay scales, along with a technology sector centred in Kanata, give the capital a broad band of middle and upper-middle incomes. Below, the region’s percentiles are set against Ontario and Canada, followed by the share of six-figure earners, how much of the local workforce is in public administration and what that work pays, what a median income covers in rent and a home, and how the tax on it differs between the Ontario and Quebec sides. Average and median income are on the Ottawa average income page; the income percentiles overview explains the method.

Ottawa income percentile table

Source: Statistics Canada Table 98-10-0064, 2020 income year (2021 Census). Values are interpolated from published $5,000-wide income brackets, not exact published percentiles. StatCan’s own published median for the same population is $49,200, versus this table’s interpolated $47,200, a normal margin for bracket interpolation. The 99th percentile reflects the floor of the open-ended “$150,000 and over” bracket, not a precise estimate.

This Census table covers the whole Ottawa-Gatineau census metropolitan area, Gatineau included, for income earned in 2020, and so do the tax-filer figures further down. The comparison is with Ontario, home to 77% of the area’s tax filers with income.

Ottawa, Ontario and Canada

Source: Statistics Canada Table 98-10-0064, 2020 income year (2021 Census), interpolated from published income brackets. The 99th percentile is the floor of the open-ended “$150,000 and over” bracket for all three geographies, so no meaningful difference can be computed at that row.

Against Ontario’s figures, the region’s 10th percentile is 24% above, its median 20% above and its 90th percentile 12% above. The lead is widest at the bottom and narrows toward the top, so Ottawa-Gatineau’s rows are bunched closer together than the province’s: the 90th percentile is 2.62 times the median here against 2.80 in Ontario, and the median is 5.8 times the 10th percentile against 6.0.

Six-figure earners in Ottawa-Gatineau

In 2023 tax data, 21.4% of Ottawa-Gatineau residents with income reported $100,000 or more, above the Ontario share (16.0%) and above Canada’s (14.8%). The region’s median income was $56,040, higher than the national $45,000.

Public administration and pay in Ottawa-Gatineau

Public administration was the region’s largest industry in the 2025 Labour Force Survey, with 194.0 thousand of 877.3 thousand people employed: 22.1%, about 3.6 times its 6.1% share across all CMAs. Counting every public employer, not only government offices, public-sector employees were 37.0% of everyone working, against 21.5% across all CMAs. Manufacturing, by contrast, held 3.5% of jobs, 0.41 times the all-CMA share.

In Ontario, public administration employees had a median wage of $1,763.30 a week in 2025, 47% above the median for all employees in the province. Over 52 weeks that comes to about $91,692, between $75,000 and $100,000: on 2023 returns, 36.3% of Ottawa-Gatineau residents with income reported the first amount or more and 21.4% the second.

Job Bank reports wages for an Ottawa economic region on the Ontario side and an Outaouais region on the Quebec side; both are drawn wider than the census area. For the four office and technology occupations below, the Ottawa region’s median was higher than Ontario’s:

What an Ottawa-Gatineau median income covers

Statistics Canada’s income survey put the median after-tax income of Ottawa-Gatineau residents aged 15 and over, counting those with no income, at $46,900 for 2024, above the national $40,500. CMHC’s 2025 survey for the Ontario side of the region put a one-bedroom at $1,604 a month and a two-bedroom at $1,939, with vacancy at 3.1%. A year of one-bedroom rent equals 41% of the individual median, and a year in a two-bedroom takes 27% of the $85,500 median after-tax income of families and unattached individuals. Ottawa rents breaks these down further, and Ottawa vs Montreal cost of living compares the two cities’ budgets.

The Ottawa Real Estate Board’s composite benchmark price was $637,700 in August 2026. On one income and the minimum down payment, a buyer would need about $144,200 a year to pass the stress test (method), which puts it in the band from $100,000 to $150,000. On 2023 returns, 14.6% of Ottawa-Gatineau residents with income fell in that band and 6.8% were above it. Prices by property type are on the Ottawa housing market page.

Ontario side or Quebec side: tax at the median

The same income is taxed differently on the two sides of the region. The survey’s median total income for Ottawa-Gatineau was $52,700; earned as wages in 2026 by someone who lives and works in Ottawa, it would leave about $42,165 after federal and Ontario tax, CPP and EI. The same pay for someone who lives and works in Gatineau is taxed on a Quebec return, with QPP and QPIP deducted and the 16.5% federal abatement for Quebec residents applied, and leaves about $40,643, $1,522 less a year. Income tax alone takes 12.8% of that income in Ontario and 15.3% in Quebec. On tax returns, the median was $56,770 on the Ontario side and $53,970 on the Quebec side in 2023. Rates and brackets are on the Ontario income tax and Quebec income tax pages.

Related pages

• Checking one income: the income percentile calculator, with Ontario selected; for a couple or family, the household income percentiles
• Ontario income percentiles
• Montreal income percentiles and Quebec City income percentiles
• Toronto income percentiles
• Average income in Ottawa
• Cost of living in Ottawa
• Income by age; gender pay gap
• All income percentile pages