Drill, blast and haul ore a kilometre below ground. A Job Bank median of about $87,000 with no degree, in exchange for shift work in the dark.
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The median pay is about $87,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $58,000 at the lower end to about $116,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
1 to 3 years, on the usual route, and you are paid while you train from the first day.
From nothing up to about $10,500, depending on the route, for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
It depends where you work. You need a licence, certificate or registration in Ontario. 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
$87,000
Lower end
$58,000
Upper end
$116,000
Job Bank's national median is $42 an hour, about $87,000 a year at 40 hours a week. The lower end is $28 and the upper end $56 an hour. Production bonuses paid per metre drilled or tonne moved come on top of these hourly figures.
$47 an hour
The median in Saskatchewan, the highest in Canada
The Northwest Territories ($44.32) and Yukon ($43.62) come next, then Alberta and British Columbia ($43). Quebec's median is $42, Ontario's is $39.70 and Nova Scotia's is the lowest, at $32. Bonus and overtime on a rotation are paid on top, and Job Bank does not measure them.
97.2%
Of miners get at least one non-wage benefit
Job Bank's national figure: a pension, health coverage, paid leave or similar. New hires often start on surface or as underground labourers, then move onto a production crew once signed off to run equipment.
Roughly, all in
Nothing to $10,500
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
Most miners never pay tuition. The usual route is getting hired first and being trained on the company's money, including the five week common core safety program, with boots and gear supplied. The low end reflects that. The high end is paying for the safety program yourself and adding an optional two year college mining diploma at 3,000 to 5,000 a year. Better Jobs Ontario funding covers up to 28,000 of training for eligible applicants, so even the paid route is often covered by someone else.
Most miners never pay tuition. The usual route is getting hired first and being trained on the company's dime.
Pension and health plans
Nearly universal at large mines. Many are unionized with the United Steelworkers.
Production bonus
Paid on top of wages when the crew hits targets.
Camp, flights and meals paid
At fly-in, fly-out sites. Your expenses at home are all you pay.
Northern living allowances
Extra pay in the territories and remote regions.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
Get hired, get trained, get signed off module by module.
High school diploma
Grade 12
The standard minimum. Math, shop and science help. A driver's licence is expected.
Safety tickets and fitness
Weeks
First aid, WHMIS (workplace hazardous materials training), and a medical. Mines test for drugs and alcohol.
Common Core, in Ontario
About 5 weeks
Ontario law requires new underground workers to complete the Basic Underground Hard Rock Miner Common Core (Program 770010). NORCAT (a mining training centre in Sudbury) runs it in 5 weeks: 2 days of theory, then hands-on practice for the rest of the program. Other provinces use company training.
Underground labourer or trainee
6 to 18 months
Scaling loose rock, moving supplies, learning the mine. You get signed off on specialty modules one at a time: bolting, drilling, mucking, driving underground trucks.
Production or development miner
1 to 3 years in
Running a jumbo drill, a scoop or a bolter on a crew, usually on bonus.
Math
Drill patterns, explosives loading and survey marks are all numbers.
Shop and mechanics
You fix your own equipment underground when it breaks.
Physics and earth science
Rock mechanics is why the roof stays up.
Physical education
Heavy work in heat and dust, 12 hours at a time.
There is no national miner's licence. In Ontario, Regulation 854 under the health and safety act makes Common Core training mandatory before you work underground, and graduates are registered with the province. Quebec offers a voluntary qualification certificate for underground miners. Handling explosives needs a separate blasting certificate in most provinces. The Mining Industry Human Resources Council (MiHR) also runs the Canadian Mining Certification Program, a voluntary credential.
In Quebec there is a short public vocational diploma in ore extraction, taught near the mines, and the trade certificate is voluntary.
Secondary III courses
From age 16
The DEP (Diploma of Vocational Studies) in Ore Extraction needs a high school diploma, or age 16 with Secondary III language, second language and math. From 18, the general development test is another way in.
DEP in Ore Extraction (5368, or 5868 in English)
About 5 months
930 hours of scaling, ground support, drilling, blasting prep and mucking, 40 hours a week. You must meet the explosives rules to enrol. Taught by the vocational centres in Val-d'Or and Baie-James.
Get hired at a mine
Weeks to months
Most underground mines are in Abitibi-Témiscamingue, Nord-du-Québec, Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean and the Gaspésie and Îles-de-la-Madeleine. Val-d'Or also teaches the program at mine sites in Saguenay and the Îles-de-la-Madeleine.
Workplace apprenticeship, optional
About 3 years
A mentor at your mine signs off five skills: scaling, ground support, drilling, blasting and mucking. About 3 years if you start with no experience. One mentor can take four apprentices.
Quebec qualification certificate
At the end
Issued once all five skills are signed off. Already worked underground for 3 years? You can have your skills recognized without the apprenticeship.
The English version, Ore Extraction (DEP 5868, a Diploma of Vocational Studies), is listed only at the CFP de la Baie-James (the James Bay vocational training centre) in Nord-du-Québec, and no English start dates were posted in October 2026. Plan on taking the French program, or ask the centre whether an English group is coming.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Jumbo drill operator
The face-drilling rig that sets the pace of development.
Blasting certificate
Loading and firing rounds. A provincial certificate plus federal explosives clearance.
Mine rescue team
Volunteer, extra training, huge respect underground.
Shift boss or supervisor
Ontario has a separate supervisor Common Core. Salary instead of bonus, more responsibility.
Heavy equipment experience
Scoops and haul trucks underground are the same idea as surface machines.
A trade
Electricians, millwrights and heavy-duty mechanics are needed at every mine.
Comfort with camp life
Two weeks in, two weeks out is normal at remote sites.
French
Quebec has some of the busiest mining camps in Canada.
Many Canadian mines are hours from the nearest town. Crews fly in for a rotation of 2 or 3 weeks, live in camp with meals and a gym, work 12-hour shifts every day, then fly home for 1 or 2 weeks off. You spend almost nothing at site, but you miss birthdays and hockey games, and camp life is not for everyone.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
Line up for the cage before 6am, safety meeting, then the ride down. At the heading you scale loose rock, check ground support, then the cycle: drill the face, load explosives, blast at shift end, and next shift mucks out the broken rock and bolts the roof. Lunch in a refuge station. It is warm, wet, loud and dark except for your headlamp. Up on the cage 11 or 12 hours later, shower, sleep, repeat.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
The Ontario Mining Association says mineral exports reached $64 billion in 2023, $42 billion of it to the US, and about one quarter of everything the province exports. It warns there are not enough workers coming through.
Job Bank counted about 29,400 underground miners in Canada in 2023. 28% are 50 or older, with a median retirement age of 64, so spots open up as they leave.
NORCAT (a mining training centre in Sudbury) runs an Underground Centre inside an operating production mine, where future mine workers train in real rock before they start a job.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Mining, oil and gas first, then the rest of the field. See every career in skilled trades.
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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