Take the X-rays and scans, or deliver radiation treatment for cancer. Two to three years of school and a national exam (Quebec has its own).
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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 $62,000 at the lower end to about $106,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
2 to 4 years after high school, on the usual route.
$13,000 to $35,000 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 Alberta, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, Nova Scotia, Ontario, Prince Edward Island, Quebec and Saskatchewan. Elsewhere there is none to hold, though many employers still ask for training or a certificate.
Good 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
$62,000
Upper end
$106,000
Job Bank's national median is $40 an hour, about $83,000 a year at 40 hours a week. The lower end ($29.81) and upper end ($51.12) are the bottom and top of the wage range for everyone in the group. Hospital jobs are unionized with a grid. On-call and overtime add real money in imaging.
$46 an hour
The median in Alberta, about $96,000 a year
Ontario is close behind at $45, and Quebec has the lowest median, $35. Technologists who cover CT (computed tomography) on-call at night and on weekends earn callback pay on top.
Roughly, all in
$13,000 to $35,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is a two year accredited college program at the cheaper rate, uniforms and immunizations, the national certification exam with its proctoring fee, and one year of provincial registration. The high end is a three year or joint college and university program at the top of the range with a fuller kit. Provincial registration of 400 to 700 a year continues for your whole career. Clinical placements are long and unpaid, so plan for months of study with no income.
Roughly $12,000 to $30,000 in tuition. Some programs are joint college and university degrees, which cost more and take 4 years.
A defined-benefit pension
One that pays a set amount every month for life. HOOPP (the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan) in Ontario hospitals. Similar plans elsewhere.
Extended health and dental
Shift premiums and on-call pay
Imaging runs 24 hours in big hospitals.
Paid vacation and sick days
Typically 3 to 4 weeks to start.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Pick a discipline early. Each has its own program.
High school
Grades 11 and 12
Grade 12 physics, biology, math and English. Chemistry helps.
Choose a discipline
Before you apply
Radiological (X-ray and CT (computed tomography)), MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), nuclear medicine, or radiation therapy. Radiological is the biggest and the usual starting point.
Accredited program
2 to 4 years
A 2 to 3 year college diploma or a 3 to 4 year joint degree. Physics, anatomy, patient care and radiation safety, then months of full-time unpaid clinical placement.
Write the CAMRT (Canadian Association of Medical Radiation Technologists) exam
After graduation
The national certification exam, one per discipline. In Quebec the order's own admission exam replaces it.
Register with your provincial regulator
A few weeks
In Ontario that is the CMRITO (College of Medical Radiation and Imaging Technologists of Ontario).
Physics
Required almost everywhere. Radiation is physics.
Biology
Required. Anatomy is the daily work.
Math
Dose calculations, especially in radiation therapy.
Chemistry
Needed for nuclear medicine.
English
You explain procedures to nervous people all day.
Programs are accredited nationally. Some examples:
Michener Institute (with University of Toronto), Mohawk College (with McMaster), Fanshawe College
Ontario
BCIT (British Columbia Institute of Technology)
British Columbia
NAIT (Northern Alberta Institute of Technology), SAIT (Southern Alberta Institute of Technology)
Alberta
Saskatchewan Polytechnic
Saskatchewan
Dalhousie
Nova Scotia
Ontario, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador each have a regulator that registers medical radiation technologists, for example the CMRITO (College of Medical Radiation and Imaging Technologists of Ontario). Elsewhere, employers require CAMRT (Canadian Association of Medical Radiation Technologists) certification. Outside Quebec, which uses its own order's exam, the exam is national, so moving provinces is simple. You register in the discipline you trained in. Adding a second one means more school and another exam.
In Quebec you train through a 3 year DEC (Diploma of College Studies) and join a Quebec order. The national CAMRT (Canadian Association of Medical Radiation Technologists) exam is only needed to work elsewhere.
Finish Secondary V
Age 16 or 17
At Dawson, Diagnostic Imaging needs Secondary IV math (Cultural, Social and Technical) and Environmental Science and Technology. Radiation Oncology asks for Secondary V math (Technical and Scientific, or Science).
Pick a 3 year DEC
3 years
Diagnostic Imaging Technology (142.H0) for X-rays, CT (computed tomography) scans and the operating room, or Radiation Oncology (142.D0) for cancer treatment. Both are in English at Dawson, with no tuition full time for Quebec residents.
Register as a student with the order
During the program
The OTIMROEPMQ (Ordre des technologues en imagerie médicale, en radio-oncologie et en électrophysiologie médicale du Québec, the Quebec order of imaging and radiation technologists). $232.25 with tax.
Pass the order's admission exam
End of the program
One exam in your discipline, written online. It is held twice a year, in June and November.
Show French, then get your permit
A few weeks
3 years of full-time school in French, or a Quebec high school diploma, counts. Otherwise you pass the OQLF (Office québécois de la langue française) exam, at no cost.
CAMRT exam, only if you may leave
Any time after
The order's permit is for Quebec. To work in another province, write the CAMRT exam as well. Dawson's imaging graduates can sit it.
Each is a 3 year DEC (Diploma of College Studies) and leads to the order's admission exam in that discipline.
Things you don't need, but that help.
CT (computed tomography)
Many X-ray technologists cross-train into it. Opens on-call shifts.
MRI (magnetic resonance imaging)
A post-diploma certificate and a separate exam.
Mammography and interventional radiology
Breast screening, or assisting with catheter procedures in a sterile suite.
PET (positron emission tomography)
Advanced nuclear medicine imaging for cancer. Few people trained.
Advanced practice radiation therapist
A master's-level role with more clinical decision-making.
Volunteer in a hospital
Positioning frightened, injured people is half the skill.
Comfort with physics and computers
Modern scanners are software.
Fitness
You lift and move patients and heavy equipment.
Calm under pressure
Trauma X-rays happen fast.
Scanner companies hire experienced technologists as applications specialists who train hospital staff on new machines. It means a lot of travel and regular hours. Many technologists move into it after 5 to 10 years on the floor.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Eight or 12 hours. In X-ray you move between the emergency department, the wards with a portable machine, and the main room, positioning a broken wrist one minute and a chest X-ray on a ventilated patient in the ICU (intensive care unit) the next. In CT (computed tomography) you scan strokes and trauma against the clock. Radiation therapists see the same cancer patients every weekday for weeks, lining them up to the millimetre and delivering a planned dose.
The good
The hard parts
Like the field but not this exact job?
Things people don't tell you.
Job Bank rates the outlook good or very good in every province where it gives a rating. It counted about 28,100 medical radiation technologists in 2023, and only 22% were 50 or older.
The national CAMRT (Canadian Association of Medical Radiation Technologists) exam runs in January, May and September in 2027, for $980 plus a proctoring fee.
Medical radiation technologist covers X-ray and CT (computed tomography), MRI (magnetic resonance imaging), nuclear medicine and radiation therapy. Each has its own program and exam.
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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