RACIALIZED groups in Canada are all experiencing growth, says Statistics Canada. In 2021, South Asian (7.1%), Chinese (4.7%) and Black (4.3%) people together represented 16.1% of Canada’s total population.

The portrait of racialized groups varies across regions. For example, the South Asian, Chinese and Black populations are the largest groups in Ontario; while the largest groups are Black and Arab people in Quebec; Chinese and South Asians in British Columbia; and South Asians and Filipinos in the Prairies.

According to the 2021 Census, most South Asians were born in South Asia, including India (44.3%), Pakistan (9.2%), Sri Lanka (5.4%) and Bangladesh (3%), while 28.7% were born in Canada and 2.1% in Africa.

Among South Asian immigrants, 21.4% immigrated to Canada recently (from 2016 to 2021) and 43.4% immigrated from 2001 to 2015. Lastly, 35.2% of South Asians were admitted in to Canada before the 2000s.

The diversity of the South Asian group can also be observed in the broad range of mother tongues reported in the 2021 Census, with English (36.4%), Punjabi (29.4%), Urdu (11.3%), Hindi (8.2%), Tamil (7.1%) and Gujarati (6.4%) the most commonly reported, alone or with other languages.

Finally, the top three religions reported by South Asians are Hinduism (29.9%), Sikhism (29.6%) and Islam (23.1%). [More details below.]

More than 450 ethnic or cultural origins were reported in the 2021 Census. The top origins reported by Canada’s population, alone or with other origins, were “Canadian” (5.7 million people), “English” (5.3 million), “Irish” (4.4 million), “Scottish” (4.4 million) and “French” (4.0 million).

In 2021, three other European origins were reported, alone or with other origins, by at least 1 million people, namely, “German” (3.0 million), “Italian” (1.5 million), and “Ukrainian” (1.3 million). And two other European origins were reported by close to 1 million people, namely, “Dutch” and “Polish”. In total, 52.5% of the population reported European origins.

“Chinese” (1.7 million people), “Indian (from India)” (1.3 million) and “Filipino” (0.9 million) were also among the ethnic or cultural origins reported most often.

In the 2021 Census, approximately 2.2 million people reported Indigenous ancestry, alone or with other ancestries, representing 6.1% of the population of Canada.

Of these, approximately 1.4 million people reported at least one of 104 First Nations (North American Indian) ancestries, more than half a million (560,000) reported “Métis” ancestry, and 82,000 people reported “Inuit” ancestry.

The most common First Nations ancestries reported were “Cree” (250,000 people), “Mi’kmaq” (122,000), “Ojibway” (92,000) and “Algonquin” (56,000). In addition, about 632,000 people reported “First Nations (North American Indian)” ancestry without any additional clarification.

RELIGION

In 2021, over 19.3 million people reported a Christian religion, representing just over half of the Canadian population (53.3%). However, this proportion is down from 67.3% in 2011 and 77.1% in 2001.

Catholics are the largest Christian denomination in Canada, with 10.9 million people (29.9%) in 2021. The United Church (3.3%) and the Anglican Church (3.1%), two other Christian denominations, each had more than 1 million people in Canada. Orthodox Christians (1.7%), Baptists (1.2%), and Pentecostals and other Charismatics (1.1%) were the other Christian denominations most often reported.

In 2021, just under 2.8 million people, or 7.6% of the population, reported being Christian without further indication of a specific denomination, double the figure from 2011 (1.4 million).

With the exception of Orthodox Christians and people who simply reported being Christian, the proportion of affiliation in every Christian denomination decreased from 2011 to 2021.

Approximately 12.6 million people, or more than one-third of Canada’s population, reported having no religious affiliation. The proportion of this population has more than doubled in 20 years, going from 16.5% in 2001 to 34.6% in 2021.

While small, the proportion of Canada’s population who reported being Muslim, Hindu or Sikh has more than doubled in 20 years.

After Christianity, Islam was the second most commonly reported religion in Canada in 2021, with nearly 1.8 million, or 1 in 20, people. In 20 years, the share of the Muslim population in Canada has more than doubled—up from 2% in 2001 to 4.9% in 2021.

In 2021, close to 830,000 people, or 2.3% of the total population, reported an affiliation to Hinduism. Like Muslims, the proportion of the population with Hinduism as its religion has more than doubled in the last 20 years, and is up from 1% in 2001.

Moreover, the share of the population who reported Sikhism as its religion also more than doubled since 2001, from 0.9% to 2.1% in 2021. About 770,000 people reported Sikhism as their religion in the 2021 Census.

Approximately 335,000 people reported being Jewish in 2021. This number has changed little over the last 20 years.

In 2021, close to 360,000 people, or 1% of Canada’s population, reported Buddhism as their religion, the same percentage as in the 2001 Census.

Yukon and British Columbia stand out with regard to their population reporting no religious affiliation. Close to three in five (59.7%) of Yukon’s population and slightly over one-half (52.1%) of British Columbia’s population reported no religious affiliation in 2021, compared with 34.6% for Canada as a whole.

In Ontario, 16.3% of the population reported being affiliated with a non-Christian religion, the highest proportion in Canada. In particular, Ontario posted the highest percentage of Muslims (6.7%) and Hindus (4.1%).

British Columbia ranked second among provinces and territories, with a large non-Christian population (13.7%). More specifically, it had the highest proportion of people affiliated with a Sikh religion (5.9%).

IMMIGRANTS: HIGHLIGHTS

* Asia, including the Middle East, remained the continent of birth for most recent immigrants (62%).

* Almost one in five recent immigrants (18.6%) were born in India, making it the leading country of birth for recent immigration to Canada.

* In contrast, the share of recent immigrants from Europe continued to decline, falling from 61.6% in 1971 to 10.1% in 2021.

* The vast majority (92.7%) of recent immigrants are able to conduct a conversation in either English or French.

* The share of second-generation Canadians (children of immigrants) younger than 15 years with at least one foreign-born parent rose from 26.7% in 2011 to 31.5% in 2021.

* Almost one in four people (23%) counted during the 2021 Census are or have been a landed immigrant or permanent resident in Canada. This was the highest proportion since Confederation, topping the previous record of 22.3% in 1921, and the largest proportion among G7 countries.

* Just over 1.3 million new immigrants settled permanently in Canada from 2016 to 2021, the highest number of recent immigrants recorded in a Canadian census.

* The share of recent immigrants settling in Atlantic Canada almost tripled in 15 years, rising from 1.2% in 2006 to 3.5% in 2021.

* Over half of recent immigrants living in Canada were admitted under the economic category. Of these 748,120 economic immigrants, just over one-third (34.5%) were selected through skilled worker programs and another one-third (33.6%) through the Provincial Nominee Program.

* The proportion of immigrants who first came to Canada temporarily on work or study permits or as asylum claimants before being admitted as permanent residents was especially high among recent immigrants who settled since 2016 (36.6%).