American film and television production in Canada rebounded in 2025, as the local industry finally put the devastating impact of Hollywood’s 2023 strike year in the rearview mirror.
The latest annual economic report from the Canadian Media Producers Association, which represents local independent producers, indicates that foreign location and service production in Canada, mostly by American producers, rose 9.5 per cent to C$5.32 billion ($3.9 billion U.S., compared with C$4.86 billion the previous year).
This production activity includes visual effects work done by Canadian VFX studios for foreign films and television series. The growth in Hollywood production was mainly due to television series production rising 12.1 percent to C$3.42 billion (US$2.51 million) and the total volume of other foreign productions – including television movies, specials, pilots and one-episode filming – increasing 54.4 percent to C$366 million (US$268.2 million).
The overall increase in television production in Hollywood last year offset a 2.2 percent decline in foreign film production across Canada. The major US players active north of the US border continue to be led by Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+ and Apple TV+, centered around production hubs in Toronto and Vancouver.
The major American series filmed in Canada last year is included IT: Welcome to Derry, the last of us, Doctor and Happy facewhile big-budget films to be filmed in Canada are included Frankenstein, Tron: Ares and Final Destination: Bloodlines.
However, the rebound in foreign productions last year fell from the record C$6.62 billion in budget spending reached in 2023, before the Canadian industry felt the impact of a strike by Hollywood actors and writers as local soundstages went dark and production crews were left out of work.
The consolidation of the Hollywood industry and the end of the era of peak television are also reducing levels of American production. American film and television production accounted for 398 projects in Canada last year, or 87 per cent of all filming on foreign locations north of the US border, with most of that concentrated in Ontario and British Columbia.
This compares to all 425 U.S. film and television projects filmed in Canada in 2024, which represents 86 percent of all foreign production activity. A rebound in U.S. production last year offset a 2.2% decline in domestic film and TV production to $US3.62 billion (US$2.65 billion), according to the CMPA report.
Total production volume in Canada last year rose 4.6 per cent to C$10.17 billion (US$7.54 billion), but that represents a 15.8 per cent decline from the peak of C$12.07 billion reached in 2023.
