Quebec Minimum Wage: General and Tipped-Worker Rates, Explained

Quebec's general minimum wage is $16.60 an hour as of May 1, 2026, but employees who receive tips are covered by a separate, lower statutory rate of $13.30 an hour, a two-tier system that Ontario and British Columbia have both eliminated.

Information last verified on 2026-09-24. This article has not yet been reviewed by a licensed lawyer.

This article covers the general and special minimum wage rates that apply to employees in Quebec under the Regulation respecting labour standards, CQLR c N-1.1, r 3, made under the Act respecting labour standards. It does not cover the minimum wage rules of any other Canadian province or the federal minimum wage for federally regulated employees; for a jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction comparison, see Minimum Wage in Canada. It also does not cover overtime pay, hours of work, or statutory holiday pay; see Overtime and Hours of Work in Canada, Statutory Holidays in Quebec, and Employment Standards Overview for those topics.

The General Minimum Wage in Quebec

Quebec's minimum wage is set by regulation and adjusted once a year, on May 1, through an annual Order in Council rather than on the October 1 date several other provinces use. Announcing the May 1, 2026 increase, the Quebec government said it was aligned with the forecast growth of Quebec's average hourly wage, bringing the minimum wage to nearly 50% of the average hourly wage for 2026-2027; it is not set by a fixed Consumer Price Index formula.

"Subject to section 4 and except to the extent provided for in section 4.1, the minimum wage payable to an employee is $16.60 per hour." (Regulation respecting labour standards, CQLR c N-1.1, r 3, s.3)

That $16.60 rate took effect May 1, 2026. The regulation notes the annual mechanism directly: "The amounts prescribed in the Regulation have been indexed as of 1 May 2026 pursuant to the notice published in Part 1 (French) of the Gazette officielle du Quebec of 18 April 2026, page 390." (s.6) Each year's increase is made through a new Order in Council amending section 3; the 2026 increase was made by Order in Council 576-2026, continuing a pattern of one order per year going back through at least 2017.

Quebec does not have an October 1 adjustment date. Ontario, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Nova Scotia, and Prince Edward Island all have rate changes scheduled for October 1, 2026, but Quebec's cycle already renewed on May 1, 2026. Its next scheduled adjustment is May 1, 2027; the figure for that increase was not available as of this article's verification date.

Tipped Workers Get a Separate, Lower Rate

Quebec is the only large province covered in this series that still keeps a genuinely lower statutory minimum wage for tipped employees. Ontario eliminated its liquor-server rate on January 1, 2022, and British Columbia eliminated its liquor-server rate on June 1, 2021; both now pay servers the general minimum wage. Quebec has not made that change.

"The minimum wage payable to an employee who receives gratuities or tips is $13.30 per hour." (Regulation respecting labour standards, CQLR c N-1.1, r 3, s.4)

That $13.30 rate also took effect May 1, 2026. The government's French-language announcement put it this way: "Le salaire minimum payable aux personnes rémunérées au pourboire sera augmenté de 0,40 $ l'heure pour atteindre 13,30 $" (unofficial English rendering: the minimum wage payable to people paid tips will increase by $0.40 an hour to reach $13.30). Under the regulation's definitions, a tipped worker is someone who ordinarily receives tips and works in a restaurant that is not a fast-food or counter-order-and-pay-before-eating establishment, a business that sells or delivers off-premises meals, an establishment that serves alcoholic beverages for consumption on the premises, or a tourist-accommodation establishment, including a campground.

Tips are paid on top of the $13.30 rate, not credited against it. An employer cannot count an employee's tips toward reaching the $13.30 figure, and it cannot count them toward the $16.60 general rate that applies to non-tipped employees.

Piece-Rate, Commission, and Farm Workers

Employees paid by commission or by the piece are still entitled to the minimum wage for their time worked. CNESST's guidance states this directly: people who are paid by the piece or on commission must be paid at least the equivalent of the minimum hourly wage rate for the time worked.

Hand-pickers of raspberries and strawberries are paid a set piece rate rather than an hourly wage under section 4.1 of the same regulation: $4.93 per kilogram of raspberries and $1.32 per kilogram of strawberries. That piece rate carries a built-in floor. An employee may not, for reasons beyond their control tied to the condition of the fields or the fruit, earn less than the $16.60 general minimum wage for the hours worked. The floor does not apply where slow picking by the worker, rather than field or crop conditions, is the reason for lower piece-rate earnings.

Who Is Exempt From the Minimum Wage

Section 2 of the regulation excludes several categories of workers from the minimum wage entirely, including:

• A student employed by a non-profit organization that has a social or community purpose, such as a vacation camp.
• A trainee in a vocational training program recognized by law.
• A trainee in the workplace-integration program for people with disabilities under the Act to secure handicapped persons in the exercise of their rights.
• An employee paid entirely on commission who works outside the employer's establishment in a commercial undertaking and whose working hours cannot be controlled by the employer.

CNESST's plain-language guidance also places student athletes whose place on a team depends on continued enrollment in an academic program outside the minimum wage rules.

Filing a Wage Complaint With CNESST

Quebec's labour standards, including the minimum wage, are enforced by the Commission des normes, de l'equite, de la sante et de la securite du travail, known as CNESST. A worker who believes they were not paid the general minimum wage, or the correct tipped-worker rate, can file a wage complaint with CNESST.

CNESST's published complaint guidance states that the worker has 1 year from the time the amounts are due to file a complaint with CNESST. That one-year period runs from when the unpaid wages became due, not from the end of employment, so a worker does not need to wait until a job ends to complain about an underpayment.

Disclaimer: This article provides general information about Quebec's minimum wage under the Regulation respecting labour standards, CQLR c N-1.1, r 3, made under the Act respecting labour standards, current as of September 2026. It is not legal advice. It does not cover overtime, hours of work, or statutory holiday pay, and it does not state a statutory section number for the CNESST wage complaint limitation period beyond what CNESST's own published guidance confirms. Consult Quebec's CNESST or a lawyer licensed in Quebec for advice on your specific situation.