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Irish Canadians

Irish Canadians (Irish: Gael-Cheanadaigh) are Canadian citizens who have full or partial Irish heritage including descendants who trace their ancestry to immigrants who originated in Ireland. 1.2 million Irish immigrants arrived from 1825 to 1970, and at least half of those in the period from 1831 to 1850. By 1867, they were the second largest ethnic group (after the French), and comprised 24% of Canada's population. The 1931 national census counted 1,230,000 Canadians of Irish descent, half of whom lived in Ontario. About one-third were Catholic in 1931 and two-thirds Protestant.[2]

Total population

2,095,460

596,750

446,215

201,655

135,835

The Irish immigrants were majority Protestant before the Irish famine years of the late 1840s, when far more Catholics than Protestants arrived. Even larger numbers of Catholics headed to the United States; others went to Great Britain and Australia.[3]


Irish Canadians comprise a subgroup of European Canadians.[a] According to the 2021 census, in terms of religion, 2,437,810 (55%) of Irish Canadians identified as Christian at the census compared to 1,905,155 identifying as secular or non-religious (43%). 1,228,640 (28%) identified as Roman Catholic and 1,190,000 (27%) identified as belonging to a Protestant denomination.[6]

British Canadians

Canada–Ireland relations

Irish Montreal before the Great Famine

List of Ireland-related topics

Leitch, Gillian Irene. "Community and Identity in Nineteenth Century Montreal: The Founding of Saint Patrick's Church." University of Ottawa Canada, 2009.

Horner, Dan. "‘If the Evil Now Growing around Us Be Not Staid’: Montreal and Liverpool Confront the Irish Famine Migration as a Transnational Crisis in Urban Governance." Histoire Sociale/Social History 46, no. 92 (2013): 349–366.

The Irish Canadian Society

The Shamrock and the Maple Leaf: Irish-Canadian Documentary Heritage at Library and Archives Canada

Irish-Canadian Documentary Heritage at Library and Archives Canada