Which Health Certificate Does Your Pet Need to Travel From Canada?

Which certificate a dog or cat needs depends on where it is going. Leaving Canada for most other countries, it travels on an export certificate that a licensed veterinarian completes and an official CFIA veterinarian endorses before departure. For the United States, the CFIA’s own pages send owners to the US authorities and ask for no CFIA endorsement. Within Canada, the airline’s own rules are the ones to read.

A form your veterinarian signs after examining the animal, recording that it is healthy, with the vaccinations and treatments the destination asks for recorded on it. For a pet leaving the country, the CFIA’s page on pet export certificates, read 14 October 2026, calls it an export certificate: issued by a licensed veterinarian, endorsed by an official CFIA veterinarian, and written to requirements the CFIA describes as very specific and different for each country.

Owners also call it a vet certificate or a travel health certificate. The name matters less than whose form it is, because a destination with a negotiated certificate expects that exact document.

Not on the CFIA’s travelling with a pet page, read 14 October 2026, which deals with pets coming into Canada and pets leaving it and has no section on a trip between provinces. The airline is where to look instead.

Air Canada’s pets page, read the same day, names no health certificate for a flight inside Canada; the certificates it discusses are for landing in another country, where it warns that one from a local clinic may not be enough to clear a government inspection. WestJet’s pets page, read the same day, mentions health certifications only for guests travelling out of the country.

A move between provinces can also go by road. Our pet transport service arranges either, with the crate and the airline booking where the pet flies.

For a dog, the US paperwork is the CDC Dog Import Form, not a CFIA certificate. The CFIA’s page on dogs travelling to the United States, read 14 October 2026, sends owners to the CDC and USDA APHIS, and says the CFIA does not play a role in US state requirements.

The CDC’s page for dogs from dog rabies-free or low-risk countries, read the same day, says the form is the only required documentation for a dog that has been only in those countries for the past 6 months, and the CFIA’s page puts Canada among them. The dog also has to look healthy on arrival, be at least 6 months old and carry a microchip a universal scanner can read.

For a cat, the CFIA’s cats and ferrets page says a Canadian licensed veterinarian should complete any document that is required, such as a vaccination certificate, and that CFIA endorsement is not required.

A US state can ask for more, and so can the airline. Our guide to moving a pet from Canada to the United States sets out what several states publish. For the trip home, the CFIA reminds owners that a returning dog still has to meet Canada’s import requirements, a valid rabies vaccination certificate among them.

An export certificate for the destination, completed by your veterinarian and endorsed by an official CFIA veterinarian at an appointment, before the pet leaves the country. The CFIA’s export page says it cannot endorse or issue a certificate once the animal has left Canada, and that some countries ask for an import permit as well as the certificate.

Where a country has no negotiated certificate and supplies none of its own, the CFIA says the Canadian International Health Certificate can be used if the country prescribes no format and its requirements can be met. Otherwise the requirements go to a CFIA animal health office for review, and negotiating a certificate can take several months.

A pet changing planes in another country can need that country’s paperwork too. The CFIA tells owners to ask the veterinary authority or embassy of the destination and of every transit country for their requirements.

Our guide to the CFIA pet export certificate explains booking the endorsement and timing the vet visit.

A licensed veterinarian in Canada completes it, and where the destination asks for endorsement, an official CFIA veterinarian then signs and stamps it. For a cat going to the United States, the CFIA’s page says its endorsement is not required, and for a dog the US paperwork is a form the owner completes online.

The export and import paperwork is part of what Pet Travel Advisors handles, along with the airline booking, the travel crate, check-in and pickup on arrival, for the whole move or for the pieces you choose. Request a quote with where your pet is going and when.

All of these were read on 14 October 2026: