The lawyer who prosecutes crimes for the public. A salary grid, a pension, and a courtroom nearly every day.
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Pay, the path, pros and cons and the facts on one printable page. Counsellors: send it to a student from your own email in one click.
Programs in the fields this career usually comes through. Each has its own page: what it takes to get in, the courses you need and what it costs.
The median pay is about $124,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $63,000 at the lower end to about $223,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
7 to 10 years after high school, on the usual route.
$62,500 to $154,500 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
Yes. It is a regulated job, so you need a licence or registration before you can work.
Moderate demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$124,000
Lower end
$63,000
Upper end
$223,000
Job Bank's figures for all lawyers and Quebec notaries in Canada, 2023 to 2024, worked out as a year at 40 hours a week. Job Bank does not publish a separate figure for Crown prosecutors. Crowns themselves are paid on public salary grids, shown on the next two cards. In Ontario, Job Bank's median for the same group is $136,000.
$82,999 to $93,262
The bottom of two published prosecutor pay scales
Quebec's prosecution service starts its prosecutors at $82,999 a year for 37.5 hours a week, from 1 April 2026. The federal lawyers' grid, which covers PPSC (Public Prosecution Service of Canada) prosecutors, starts at $93,262 from May 10, 2025. Some provinces hire new Crowns on contract first, until a permanent spot opens.
$192,423 to $228,084
The top of the same two pay scales
Quebec's prosecutor scale tops out at $192,423 from 1 April 2026. The federal grid tops out at $206,386 for working-level counsel and $228,084 for senior counsel, from May 10, 2025.
Roughly, all in
$62,500 to $154,500
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is a three year undergraduate degree and three years of law school at the cheapest Canadian tuition, plus the LSAT (Law School Admission Test) and licensing fees. The high end is a four year degree and a law school near $35,000 a year. There is no extra cost to become a Crown on top of the ordinary lawyer's licence, and no practice to set up. What the numbers hide is time: Crown offices usually hire lawyers who already have courtroom experience, so the wait costs years rather than dollars.
Same schooling as any lawyer. There is no extra cost to become a Crown, and no practice to set up.
Defined-benefit pension
Provincial Crowns join the public service pension plan. Federal Crowns get the federal one.
Health, dental, paid vacation and parental leave
No clients to find
The cases come to you. No billing, no marketing, no chasing fees.
Job security
Permanent Crowns are rarely laid off.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Become a lawyer, then get hired by a government prosecution service. These steps are for outside Quebec, which has its own route: tap Quebec route to add it.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
Strong marks in English and any writing-heavy course.
Bachelor's degree
3 to 4 years
Any subject. Write the LSAT (law school admission test).
Law school (JD, juris doctor)
3 years
Take criminal law, evidence, criminal procedure and trial advocacy. Do a criminal moot if you can.
Licensing
About 1 year
Article at a Crown attorney's office if you can get in, or at a criminal defence firm. Both count. Then the bar exams.
Get hired
0 to 3 years
Apply to your province's Attorney General or to the PPSC (Public Prosecution Service of Canada). Openings are competitive. Many start on short contracts.
English and writing
Every case has a written brief.
Law and civics
You will spend your career inside the Criminal Code and the Charter of Rights.
Drama or debate
Speaking on your feet in front of a judge is the job.
French
Federal prosecutors and New Brunswick Crowns need it. Bilingual trials happen everywhere.
You need a lawyer's licence from your provincial law society. Then you are an employee. Provincial Crowns prosecute most Criminal Code offences and work for the provincial Attorney General. Federal Crowns at the PPSC (Public Prosecution Service of Canada) handle drug, tax and organized crime cases, and every prosecution in the three territories. Moving provinces means requalifying with that law society and reapplying.
Quebec runs on civil law and has its own bar. You go to law school straight from CEGEP (public college), with no LSAT (Law School Admission Test), then do the bar school and a 6 month internship.
Finish Secondary V
Age 16 or 17
Any Quebec high school diploma opens the pre-university CEGEP (public college) programs that lead to law school.
Pre-university DEC (Diploma of College Studies)
2 years
Usually 2 years, often Social Science, at a CEGEP (public college). Law schools rank Quebec applicants by R score (cote R, a ranking of college grades). Montréal had 196 places for 1,319 applications from CEGEP students for 2026.
Civil law degree
3 to 4 years
An LL.B. (Bachelor of Laws), 3 years, at Montréal, Laval, Sherbrooke, UQAM (Université du Québec à Montréal), Outaouais or Ottawa. McGill teaches in English and gives civil and common law degrees together in 3.5 to 4 years.
École du Barreau (the Quebec bar school)
About 9 months
Courses and three exams, then a supervised legal clinic, in Montréal, Quebec City, Sherbrooke or Gatineau. Tuition is $6,065 for 2026 to 2027, with three tries at each exam.
6 month internship (stage)
6 months
The DPCP (Directeur des poursuites criminelles et pénales, Quebec's prosecution service) takes bar interns at $37.88 an hour, 35 hours a week, across Quebec. Then you take the oath and join the Roll.
Qualify with the DPCP
Months
Pass a written exam in criminal and penal law, an interview and a security check. If you pass, you stay in the hiring pool for 3 years and apply to openings.
Premiums are added for remote regions and some special assignments.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Guns and gangs, sexual assault, homicide teams
Specialized units in big cities. Senior Crowns compete for them.
Appeals
Arguing at the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court of Canada. Writing-heavy.
Management
Deputy Crown attorney, then Crown attorney for a region, then ministry roles.
The bench
Many judges were Crowns. After 10 years at the bar you can apply.
Defence experience
Crowns who have defended people are better at spotting weak cases.
A summer or articling term with a Crown office
The best way in. Offices hire people they know.
A criminal law clinic in law school
Thick skin
You will lose cases you should have won and be criticized either way.
The PPSC (Public Prosecution Service of Canada) prosecutes drug offences, tax evasion, terrorism and organized crime. It has offices in every region and handles all criminal prosecutions in Yukon, the Northwest Territories and Nunavut. That means fly-in circuit courts to small communities. Northern postings come with isolation allowances on top of salary.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
8:30 a.m.: read the files for today's bail hearings, some of which arrived overnight. 9:30: bail court, ten matters. Lunch at your desk reviewing disclosure. Afternoon: a guilty plea, a pre-trial meeting with defence counsel, prep for tomorrow's trial, a phone call with a nervous witness. Home by 6 with a file for the evening. Trial days run longer.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Criminal cases are brought in the name of the Crown, so every case is styled R versus the accused. R stood for Regina, the Queen, until 2022. It now stands for Rex, the King.
In 1955 the Supreme Court of Canada wrote that a prosecutor's job is not to get a conviction but to lay the evidence before the court fairly. Crowns are trained to drop cases they should not win.
Since a 2016 Supreme Court of Canada ruling, most cases must finish within 18 months in provincial court or 30 months in superior court. Miss the deadline and the charges are stayed. That ruling drives Crown workloads.
In BC (British Columbia), Quebec and New Brunswick, police must get a prosecutor's approval before charging someone. Everywhere else, police lay the charge and the Crown reviews it afterward.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Lawyers first, then the rest of the field. See every career in law and public safety.
Last checked October 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in Canadian dollars, based on Government of Canada Job Bank wage data and published salary grids. They vary by province, employer and experience. Tuition is for domestic students. How every figure on this site is sourced and checked.
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