Paren data: Canada's EV fast-charging network grows to 9,615 ports in Q3, Tesla adds the most new ports

EVwire brief: Canada's public DC fast-charging network grew to 9,615 ports in Q3 2026, with Tesla adding more new ports than any other network. Tesla also opened the quarter's largest site, a 24-stall Supercharger in Mont-Tremblant, Québec.

Operators added 391 new ports and 103 new stations during the quarter, bringing the national network to 2,740 stations, according to Paren's latest State of the EV Charging Industry report for Canada.

That's 3.5% more stations and 4.2% more ports than in Q2, and 20.4% and 26.8% more than in Q3 2025, when Canada had 2,275 stations and 7,585 ports. In 2024 and 2025, Q3 openings beat Q2 by more than 70%. This year, Q3 matched Q2 almost exactly, leaving new stations about a third below Q3 2025.

Here's Paren's look at new fast-charging stations and ports by quarter:

Demand picked back up. Drivers logged 3.84 million fast-charging sessions in Q3, up 37% year-over-year, with August setting a monthly record of 1.38 million. National utilization rebounded to 10.4% from a Q2 low of 9.55%, the reliability score eased to 91.1 from 91.4, and the average price fell to CA$0.486 (about US$0.35) per kWh from CA$0.500 (about US$0.36).

Tesla added 88 new ports, or 22.5% of the quarter's total, followed by Circuit électrique with 61 and ChargePoint with 41. Tesla now has 3,091 ports in Canada, up from 2,729 a year ago, or 32.1% of the national network.

Here's how the quarter's additions broke down by network, as per Paren data.

Here are some highlights from Paren's Q3 2026 State of the EV Charging Industry report for Canada.

New non-Tesla stations averaged 3.2 new ports each in Q3, level with Q2, and brand-new sites alone averaged 3.3. Small sites are still common: 36 of the quarter's 93 new sites (38.7%) had two ports or fewer, though that's down from 46.8% in Q2. ChargePoint (10 of 16 new sites) and Flo (9 of 10) opened the most of them.

Tesla's new stations averaged 9.8 ports across nine stations. Tesla opened 7 of the quarter's 17 new sites with six or more ports, including the 24-stall Supercharger in Mont-Tremblant and a 16-stall site in Drummondville, both in Québec. Outside Tesla, Park + Charge opened three 8-port sites in Toronto, Collingwood and Oshawa, while Electrify Canada and Circuit électrique each opened 8-port sites in Vaughan and Montréal.

Here's how Tesla and non-Tesla station sizes have tracked over the past five quarters:

A third of Canada's new ports in Q3 were rated at 250 kW or more, and 2% were rated at 400 kW or more. In the US, those figures were 73% and 31% in the same quarter, as per our US Q3 Paren coverage. Among non-Tesla networks, 14% of new ports in Canada were rated at 250 kW or more, compared with 61% in the US.

Tesla supplied 88 of the 123 new ports in the 250 to 399 kW band, all rated at 325 kW across nine sites. Among other networks, Eddie opened seven sites with 14 ports at 280 to 320 kW, Electrify Canada added 8 ports at 350 kW and HyperCharge added 7 ports at 280 to 350 kW. Mercedes-Benz HPC opened a six-port site rated at 400 kW. Chargers between 150 and 249 kW remained the largest group at 42% of new ports.

Here's Paren's breakdown of new ports by power level:

Canadian drivers logged 3.84 million fast-charging sessions on tracked ports in Q3, up 37% from 2.80 million a year earlier. Over the same period, the number of tracked ports grew 51% to 8,820, so each port averaged 436 sessions in the quarter, down from 481. This means that Canada's network is still being built ahead of demand.

Summer 2026 set new monthly highs, with 1.29 million sessions in July and 1.38 million in August, before September came in at 1.17 million. On a per-port basis, July and August came in at 161 and 157 sessions, up from 137 in June, compared with 181 and 185 in the same months of 2025.

Here's Paren's chart of monthly sessions and sessions per port:

Canada's national utilization rose to 10.38% in Q3 from 9.55% in Q2, and on networks Paren tracked in both quarters, it climbed to 10.7% from 9.4%. Three networks tracked for the first time averaged just 6.5%, which held the national figure back. Every province and territory improved on Q2, with British Columbia (13.1%) and Ontario (11.5%) leading Prince Edward Island (10.1%), New Brunswick (9.0%) and Québec (8.5%).

Among Canada's 10 largest metros, Vancouver led at 22.8%, compared with 25.7% a year ago, followed by Toronto at 17.3%, Kitchener–Cambridge–Waterloo at 16.4% and Calgary at 14.7%. Every province and territory remains below 20% utilization.

Here's Paren's map of utilization by province and territory:

And here's how Canada's 10 largest metros stacked up:

Canada's national reliability score slipped to 91.1 in Q3 from 91.4 in Q2 and 93.7 a year ago, with 10 of 12 provinces and territories below their Q3 2025 scores. The Northwest Territories (77.8), Yukon (85.3) and Nova Scotia (86.3) sat below the 90 mark, while Newfoundland and Labrador climbed above it to 90.7 from 80.3.

Nova Scotia's score fell from 95.4 as Paren's tracked stations in the province rose by a third. Ontario sits closest to the 90 line among the remaining provinces, and was below it in Q1 at 89.

Here's Paren's map of reliability scores by province and territory:

Context:

Daniel Breton, President and CEO of Electric Mobility Canada, the country's EV industry association, wrote this edition's guest perspective. Citing the network's 26.8% year-over-year port growth, he wrote:

Geographically, Québec led all provinces with 49 new stations, up from 44 in Q2, followed by Ontario with 22, British Columbia with 18 and Alberta with 5. Rural openings rose to 46 stations from 36, led by Circuit électrique with 12, while urban openings fell to 57, or 55% of the total. Toronto added six stations, the most of any city, and New Brunswick and the Northwest Territories returned to the map with four and two new stations, respectively.

Source: Paren State of the EV Charging Industry Canada Q3 2026

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