Simar Dua · French Program Lead
Updated:
On October 16, 2026, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) held Express Entry round #450, a French-language proficiency draw. It issued 5,000 invitations to apply and the CRS score of the lowest-ranked candidate invited was 435. That is 53 points higher than the August 19, 2026 round, which invited 5,000 candidates at 382.
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The round in numbers
| Draw date | October 16, 2026 |
| Round | #450 (French-Language proficiency 2026-Version 2) |
| Invitations issued | 5,000 |
| CRS cut-off | 435 |
| Tie-breaking rule | Profiles submitted before Oct 06, 2026, 21:31 UTC |
| 2026 so far | 11 French draws, 55,500 invitations, cut-offs 382 to 435 |
Every French draw since 2023, with the cut-off trend, is on our French draw tracker.
Who qualified
Only candidates already in the Express Entry pool with NCLC 7 or higher in all four French abilities were eligible. On the TEF Canada that means at least 207 in reading, 249 in listening and 310 in writing and speaking on the Équivalence ancien score scale; on the TCF Canada, 453 in reading, 458 in listening and 10 out of 20 in writing and speaking. The band tables are on the TEF Canada score chart and the TCF Canada score chart.
NCLC 7 in all four abilities also adds 25 or 50 CRS points, depending on your English level, on top of the core language points for French.
What to do next
If your French results are below NCLC 7 in any ability, that one ability is what keeps you out of the next round. Our TEF Canada preparation course and TCF Canada preparation course train all four abilities with weekly corrected practice; most students who start at A2 or B1 reach NCLC 7 in four to six months.
Keep reading
Simar Dua, French Program Lead
Simar leads the TEF Canada and TCF Canada programs at Toronto French Academy and has guided hundreds of Express Entry candidates from their first French lesson to the NCLC 7 result. She hosts the academy’s free monthly French for Canada PR info session.
