The physicist who makes sure the radiation machines in a cancer centre are safe and accurate. A PhD, a residency and a national exam. Long road, rare job, high pay.
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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 $117,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $73,000 at the lower end to about $200,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
8 to 12 years after high school, on the usual route.
$29,000 to $42,000 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
No. There is no licence 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
$117,000
Lower end
$73,000
Upper end
$200,000
Job Bank's national median is $56.49 an hour, about $117,000 a year at 40 hours a week. Job Bank pools medical physicists with all other physicists and astronomers, so this is the group figure. The lower end ($34.95) and upper end ($96.15) are the bottom and top of the wage range for the whole group.
$65.83 an hour
Saskatchewan, about $137,000 a year at 40 hours a week (Job Bank)
Manitoba is next at $64.71 and Ontario at $60.08. Cancer agencies pay on a professional grid that climbs with years and responsibility.
Roughly, all in
$29,000 to $42,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
Only the four year physics degree is genuinely paid out of pocket, at 7,000 to 10,000 a year. Master's and doctoral study in medical physics is normally covered by stipends and teaching work, so those years add exam and membership fees rather than tuition. The certification exams through the Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine are about 845 for the written and oral together. The real cost of this career is the eight to twelve years before a first full salary, not the fees.
Graduate school in physics is usually funded, so debt is mostly from the undergrad. The real cost is time: a decade before your first full salary.
A defined-benefit pension
One that pays a set amount every month for life. HOOPP (the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan) in Ontario. Provincial cancer agencies elsewhere have similar plans.
Extended health and dental
Mostly weekday hours
Machine checks happen after the last patient, so some evenings. Little true on-call.
Research and teaching time
Many positions come with a university appointment.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
As long as becoming a doctor, with a physics degree instead of medical school.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
Top marks in physics, calculus, chemistry and English.
Bachelor's in physics
4 years
Or engineering physics. Strong marks, research summers, and comfort with programming.
Accredited graduate degree
2 to 6 years
A master's or PhD in medical physics from a CAMPEP (Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Education Programs) accredited program. Thirteen Canadian universities qualify, including UBC (University of British Columbia), Alberta, Calgary, McGill, Laval, Toronto Metropolitan, Western and Dalhousie. Outside Quebec, most clinical jobs expect the PhD; in Quebec the accredited master's is the usual entry.
Residency
2 years
Two years of supervised clinical training at a cancer centre. Thirteen accredited programs across Canada, from BC (British Columbia) Cancer in Vancouver to the Ottawa Hospital. Positions are few and competitive.
CCPM (Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine) exam
After residency
Needs a graduate degree and two years of patient-related physics experience. A written exam in March and an oral exam in May. Recertify every 5 years.
Physics
The whole field is physics.
Calculus and functions
Required for any physics degree.
Computer science
Treatment planning and quality checks are software.
Biology
You need to understand what the radiation is hitting.
No province licenses medical physicists, but the CCPM (Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine) certification has become the standard for clinical jobs and is required for senior positions. The College was founded in 1979 and certifies mainly in radiation oncology physics, with separate certifications for mammography and a fellowship level. Provincial radiation safety rules also name the physicist as the person responsible for machine calibration, so the job carries legal responsibility even without a licence.
In Quebec a 3 year physics bachelor's follows CEGEP (public college), and Laval says its master's is the way into a Quebec hospital job.
Finish Secondary V
Age 16 or 17
With Secondary V math (Technical and Scientific, or Science option), chemistry and physics. These are the entry courses for the CEGEP (public college) science program.
Science DEC (Diploma of College Studies)
2 years
A 2 year CEGEP (public college) program (200.B1), offered in English at Dawson and the other English colleges. At Laval it gives direct entry to physics.
Bachelor's in physics
3 years
3 years after CEGEP. Laval's is 91 credits. Keep your marks high: McGill's medical physics master's asks for at least 3.5 out of 4.0.
Master's in medical physics
2 years
Both Quebec programs are CAMPEP (Commission on Accreditation of Medical Physics Education Programs) accredited and take 2 years: McGill in English, about 7 or 8 students a year, and Laval, the only accredited one in French.
Residency
2 years
McGill runs the only accredited residency in Quebec, 2 years in radiation oncology physics, with sites including the McGill University Health Centre, the Jewish General and the Centre hospitalier de l'Université de Montréal.
CCPM (Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine) exam
After residency
The same national certification as in the rest of Canada. Quebec has no professional order for physicists.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Radiation oncology physics
The biggest branch. Calibrating linear accelerators, checking treatment plans, commissioning new machines.
Diagnostic imaging physics
Quality and radiation dose for CT (computed tomography), X-ray and mammography. Fewer positions, less on-site pressure.
Nuclear medicine and MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) physics
Smaller specialties in large academic centres.
Industry and regulation
Equipment makers, the federal nuclear regulator and provincial safety agencies all hire medical physicists.
Programming
Python and scripting for planning systems and data. Expected, not optional.
Research publications
Residency committees read them.
Hands-on lab skills
Detectors, phantoms and measurement rigs are your tools.
Patience
Machine checks are repetitive and precise, and they are what keeps patients safe.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Mornings are often plan checks: reviewing each new patient's radiation plan for dose and safety before treatment starts, and answering therapists' questions when a setup looks off. Midday might be commissioning a new technique or troubleshooting a machine fault with the engineers. After the last patient leaves you take the linear accelerator through its quality checks with detectors and phantoms, sometimes until 8pm. Add research, teaching residents, and committee work on radiation safety.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
COMP (the Canadian Organization of Medical Physicists) says it has a membership of over 800 medical physicists and affiliate organizations. The number of certified clinical physicists is smaller still, which is why each one is responsible for so much.
The CCPM (Canadian College of Physicists in Medicine) written exam is held across Canada in March, and candidates then travel to Montréal for a two-day oral exam: in 2027, on May 1 and 2 at McGill's Steinberg simulation centre.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Diagnostics and lab first, then the rest of the field. See every career in health.
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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