Study ocean life on three coasts. Popular, competitive, and mostly funded by fisheries and government science.
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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 $83,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $53,000 at the lower end to about $139,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
4 to 8 years after high school, on the usual route.
$29,000 to $52,000 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
It depends where you work. You need a licence, certificate or registration in British Columbia. Elsewhere there is none to hold, though many employers still ask for training or a certificate.
Limited 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
$83,000
Lower end
$53,000
Upper end
$139,000
Job Bank's national median is $40 an hour, about $83,000 a year at 40 hours a week. The lower end ($25.71) and upper end ($66.67) are the bottom and top of the wage range for everyone in the group. That page pools marine biologists with other life scientists. Most working marine biologists in Canada are paid on a federal or provincial science grid.
$58.34 an hour
The median in the Northwest Territories, about $121,000 a year
Saskatchewan is the top province at $42.85; British Columbia is at $42 and Nova Scotia at $37.50. First jobs are often as a field technician on a survey vessel, a hatchery or a shoreline crew. Early work is usually contract and seasonal, often six to eight months at a time. Many people stack a field season with winter lab work to make a full year.
Roughly, all in
$29,000 to $52,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is a four year marine biology degree at a cheaper university plus the basic scientific diver and small vessel operator tickets. The high end adds a field course or a semester at sea, which is expensive but is where most of the contacts come from, and the pricier dive and boat training. A master's degree is close to standard in this field and usually comes funded with a stipend of roughly $20,000 a year, so it is not in these figures. Moving to the coast for school and field seasons is a real expense that nobody puts in the brochure.
Moving to the coast for school and field seasons is a real cost that nobody puts in the brochure.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada
The largest employer. Stock assessments, habitat science, marine mammals. Its permanent research scientist jobs are few, usually need a PhD and come with a pension that pays a set amount for life.
Aquaculture companies
Salmon and shellfish farms in British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. The most reliable private hiring.
Environmental consulting
Marine impact assessments for ports, cables, wind and shipping projects.
Universities and aquariums
Research, teaching and public education. Few positions, many applicants.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Be honest with yourself early: this is a popular field with a small number of permanent jobs.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
Biology, chemistry and math. Learn to swim well and get comfortable on boats.
Biology or marine biology degree
4 years
Four years. Dalhousie, Memorial, the University of British Columbia, the University of Victoria, Vancouver Island University and Ontario Tech all have marine streams. Take a coastal field course.
Field seasons
2 to 3 summers
Summer technician contracts on vessels, at hatcheries or on shoreline crews. These contacts decide who gets the next job.
Master's degree
2 years
Nearly standard for anything past technician work. Funded, two years, and built around your own research question.
PhD, if you want to run research
4 to 6 years
Required for a permanent government research scientist or professor position.
Biology
The core of every marine program.
Chemistry
Ocean chemistry, water quality and acidification.
Math and statistics
Fisheries science is population modelling, which is heavy math.
Physics
Useful for currents, acoustics and instrument work.
Outside British Columbia you do not need a licence to be a marine biologist. In British Columbia, applied biology work, including assessments that go to a regulator, is reserved for registrants of the College of Applied Biologists, who hold the Registered Professional Biologist (R.P.Bio) title. Scientific diving is separately regulated by provincial occupational health and safety rules, so if you plan to dive for work you need the right certification and a dive plan.
Atlantic Canada
Dalhousie University, Memorial University, University of New Brunswick, Université Sainte-Anne.
Pacific coast
University of British Columbia, University of Victoria, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver Island University.
Inland with marine streams
Ontario Tech University, University of Guelph, Université Laval, Université du Québec à Rimouski.
Quebec's marine science is centred on the St. Lawrence estuary at Rimouski, and the main degree and master's there are taught in French.
Finish Secondary V
High school
Take the Secondary V math and science courses that your CEGEP (public college) asks for its science program.
Science DEC (Diploma of College Studies)
UQAR (Université du Québec à Rimouski) asks for a DEC with college biology, chemistry, math and physics, and an R-score (college ranking score) of at least 23.
Biology bachelor's at UQAR (Université du Québec à Rimouski)
90 credits, with a Marine Sciences concentration. 78% of the biology courses include labs or field trips, many on the St. Lawrence estuary.
Master's in oceanography
At ISMER (Institut des sciences de la mer de Rimouski, the marine science institute): 45 credits with a thesis, in French, and a mission on the research ship Coriolis II. Find a supervisor before you apply.
Funding for the master's
During the master's
The institute can pay up to $1,325 a term for 5 terms when your supervisor also funds you.
Federal research jobs
Fisheries and Oceans Canada runs its Quebec region science from the Maurice Lamontagne Institute in Mont-Joli.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Scientific diver certification
Required for most underwater research work, and expensive to keep current.
Small vessel operator proficiency
The basic boat ticket that lets you run a research skiff.
Marine emergency duties training
Required before you can work on most vessels.
Statistics and coding
The R programming language is the standard tool in fisheries science. This skill separates people who get hired from people who do not.
Species identification
Being able to identify fish, invertebrates or algae by sight is a hireable skill on its own.
Acoustics or tagging experience
Tracking animals with sound and tags is a growing niche.
Not getting seasick
Said with a straight face. Survey trips can be a week offshore in rough water.
Fish farming is where most private sector marine biology jobs in Canada actually are, on the coasts of British Columbia, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. The work is fish health, water quality, feed and site monitoring. It is year round, and it is a real career. Some marine biology students dismiss it on principle and then discover it was the main employer all along.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
In field season you are on a boat at first light, running transects, hauling nets or gear, measuring and releasing animals, logging everything. Wet, cold, repetitive and genuinely good. The rest of the year is a desk: cleaning survey data, running population models, writing stock assessments and papers, and sitting in meetings where your numbers meet fishing quotas and someone's livelihood. Whale and aquarium work is a small slice of the field, not the middle of it.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Statistics Canada measures it at 243,042 kilometres, across the Atlantic, Pacific and Arctic. Indonesia, Russia and the United States do not come close.
Fisheries and Oceans Canada counts the northern cod spawning stock falling from about 1.5 million tonnes in 1962 to about 125,000 by 1977. The fishery was shut in July 1992, and a commercial fishery only reopened in 2024, with an 18,000 tonne limit.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Life and lab first, then the rest of the field. See every career in science and environment.
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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