What is the difference between the Ontario Job Grant and Better Jobs Ontario?

The Ontario Job Grant is for employers: you apply, you choose the training, and the money reimburses training costs for people you employ. Better Jobs Ontario is for individuals: a laid-off or unemployed worker applies through an Employment Ontario service provider for training support of up to $28,000 for programs of one year or less, or up to $35,000 for programs of one to two years. The two cannot cover the same trainee's costs at the same time — someone participating in Better Jobs Ontario or the Skills Development Fund for the same training is an ineligible OJG trainee.

Can the Ontario Job Grant fund an apprentice, a business owner, or a temporary foreign worker?

No to all three. The 2026 guidelines make training an apprentice explicitly ineligible. The employer, and anyone related to, affiliated with, or controlling the employer — including board members, shareholders and immediate family — cannot be trainees. Trainees must be Canadian citizens, permanent residents or protected persons living in Ontario; people working in Canada temporarily or with temporary status are ineligible.

How long do I have to complete Ontario Job Grant training?

Training must be completed within 52 weeks of the training start date. Training must be delivered in Ontario, by an eligible training provider, and only to trainees you identified in the application. Training must not have started before you apply.

COJG Is Now the Ontario Job Grant — Open, With New Rules

Q: What changed between COJG and the Ontario Job Grant?

Five things matter most. Employers must now have a physical Ontario location where they have been carrying out business for at least one year. Training providers must have an Ontario physical presence and at least two years delivering that training, and instructors must meet stated experience or credential thresholds. Only individual employers with 25 or fewer participants are being accepted, and only one application per employer at a time. Funding is no longer automatic on eligibility: the ministry assesses value for money against a fixed total program budget. Priority goes to training that leads to a new or better job and to employers who have not received OJG funding in the past six months.

Short answer: the Canada-Ontario Job Grant (COJG) is now the Ontario Job Grant (OJG). It is open, applications are accepted year-round, and it pays up to $10,000 per trainee for third-party training. Employers with 100 or more employees split costs 50/50 with the province. Employers with fewer than 100 employees pay at least one-sixth, so Ontario covers up to five-sixths — and if the trainee is a new hire who was previously unemployed, the ceiling rises to $15,000 with no minimum employer contribution. The ministry is currently accepting applications only from individual employers training 25 or fewer participants.

What Happened to COJG

Most pages on this subject still describe a program that stopped existing. Here is the actual sequence, and the five rule changes that decide whether you are still eligible.

Quick answer: COJG was paused in November 2025 for a ministry review. It did not resume. Ontario redesigned it and relaunched it as the Ontario Job Grant, with Application Guidelines effective 1 May 2026. The ontario.ca address for COJG now redirects to the Ontario Job Grant page, so any COJG form or portal link you bookmarked is dead.

November 2025 COJG placed on pause for a ministry review. New intake stops.
Spring 2026 The Ministry of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development winds the old program down rather than restarting it, and rebuilds the delivery model.
1 May 2026 New Ontario Job Grant Application Guidelines take effect. The program is renamed; the funding structure carries over, several eligibility rules do not.
4 May 2026 Employment Ontario publishes the launch notice: “The Government of Ontario is launching the redesigned Canada-Ontario Job Grant program under the new name Ontario Job Grant (OJG).”
26 June 2026 — current ontario.ca updated. OJG “accepts application year-round”, and the ministry is “currently accepting applications from individual employers if they involve training 25 or fewer participants.”

The five rule changes that actually matter

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COJG before the pause vs Ontario Job Grant from 1 May 2026
Rule	Under COJG	Under OJG
Employer tenure	No stated minimum time in business	Physical Ontario location, carrying out business there at least one year
Training provider	Third party, accredited or Career Colleges Act registered	Same, plus physical Ontario presence and two or more years delivering that training
Instructors	Not separately specified	48 months relevant experience in the last 10 years, or 24 months plus a degree, certificate of qualification, or graduate status
Who can apply now	Individual employers and group applications	Individual employers only, 25 or fewer participants, one open application at a time
Approval	Effectively eligibility-driven	Fixed total budget. “Meeting the requirements does not guarantee funding.” Assessed on value for money and ministry priorities

Verdict

If you were eligible for COJG, re-check two things before you do anything else: whether your business has been operating at its current Ontario location for a full year, and whether your training provider has been delivering that specific training for at least two years with a physical Ontario presence. Those two lines are new, they are absolute, and they are what quietly disqualifies employers who would have been approved a year ago.

Deep dive: everything the 2026 guidelines added, removed, or tightened

Newly ineligible training. OJG will not fund training an apprentice, curriculum development, membership, subscription or association fees, or lobbyists and consultants hired to help an employer with an OJG application. Those sit alongside the exclusions carried over from COJG: training you are legally required to provide, vendor training on the vendor's own product or service, executive and preparatory courses such as MBA, CFA, LSAT, MCAT and GMAT, business consulting services, attending conferences, and any training over one year in length.

Newly ineligible trainees. Training for business owners, including anyone who is a controlling party in a corporation, is excluded outright. So is any person related to, affiliated with, or having control or influence over the employer — board members, shareholders, and immediate family including spouses, common-law partners, adult interdependent partners, children, parents and siblings. Contractors and volunteers are out because they are not employees. People working in Canada temporarily, or holding temporary status such as temporary foreign workers, are out. Eligible trainees must be Canadian citizens, permanent residents or protected persons living in Ontario, legally authorised to work in Canada, and employed by and identified by the applying employer.

Newly ineligible employers. Beyond the government bodies COJG already excluded, the guidelines name designated broader public sector organisations as defined by the Broader Public Sector Accountability Act, district social services administration boards, and Employment Ontario or Integrated Employment Services service providers and Service System Managers. Any organisation already receiving other government funds for the same, or substantially similar, skills training for the same trainees is also excluded.

Priority, not just eligibility. Highest priority goes to training that helps support trainees into a new or better job, which the ministry explicitly extends to retaining employees who have received a formal notice of layoff, and to employers who have not received OJG funding in the past six months. The ministry also states that funding decisions depend on current program demand and the number of applications in your area.

Timing changed shape. Training must be completed within 52 weeks of the training start date, delivered in Ontario, by an eligible training provider, and provided only to trainees the employer identified. Training must not have started before the application is submitted — that rule survived the redesign intact and is still the single most common self-inflicted rejection.

Provider categories widened. The eligible provider list now names publicly assisted colleges, universities and Indigenous Institutes in Ontario, District School Boards, career colleges and vocational programs registered under (or exempt from registration under) the Ontario Career Colleges Act, 2005, union-based training centres, sector councils, and industry associations. Sector councils and industry associations are a genuinely useful addition for trades and manufacturing employers who previously struggled to find an eligible provider.

The Ontario Job Grant Math

The funding structure survived the redesign unchanged. It is unusually generous for employers under 100 people, and most of them never use it.

What you actually pay

The grant supports eligible training costs up to $10,000 per trainee. Employers with fewer than 100 employees must contribute at least one-sixth of each trainee's training costs, so Ontario covers up to five-sixths, about 83%.

Under 100 employees

1/6

Your minimum contribution per trainee. Ontario covers up to 5/6, capped at $10,000 per trainee.

100 or more employees

1/2

Costs split 50/50 with the government, whether or not the trainee was previously unemployed. Cap still $10,000.

Unemployed new hire, under 100 employees

Up to $15,000 per trainee, no minimum employer contribution required. Up to 100% funding.

$3,000 certification, one trainee, employer under 100 staff

You: from $500 Ontario: up to $2,500

$7,200 professional designation, one trainee, under 100 staff

You: from $1,200 Ontario: up to $6,000

$15,000 course, one trainee, under 100 staff — the cap binds

You: $5,000 Ontario: $10,000 maximum

$12,000 course, one trainee, employer with 100+ staff

You: $6,000 Ontario: $6,000 (cap only binds past $20,000)

$9,000 course, previously unemployed new hire, under 100 staff

You: $0 Ontario: up to $9,000

Five trainees at $6,000 each, employer under 100 staff

You: from $5,000 Ontario: up to $25,000

Here is what to take from the math. The employer share is a floor, not a fixed price. The guidelines say “at least” one-sixth, and the ministry decides the amount of reimbursable costs, so treat five-sixths as your best case rather than your quote. The $10,000 cap only starts to bite above a $12,000 course for a small employer, and above a $20,000 course for a large one — well past the price of nearly every certification, designation and technical course sold in Ontario. In practice the cap is not the constraint. The fixed program budget and the priority ranking are.

Are You Eligible? Work Down the List

Five gates, in the order they will be applied to you. A no at any step ends the application, so work down this list before you contact a training provider.

Ontario Job Grant eligibility, step by step

Drawn from the eligibility requirements published on ontario.ca, updated 26 June 2026.

1. Do you have a physical location in Ontario, and have you been carrying out business there for at least one year? NO → you are not eligible yet. This is the newest gate and there is no workaround. Come back once you clear a year at that location.
YES → go to step 2.

2. Are you a private-sector or non-profit employer, and not a government body, broader-public-sector organisation, district social services administration board, or an Employment Ontario service provider? NO → ineligible. Public bodies and Employment Ontario delivery partners are excluded by name.
YES → go to step 3.

3. Is the person you want to train an employee who is a Canadian citizen, permanent resident or protected person living in Ontario, and not you, an owner, a relative, a contractor or a volunteer? NO → that person cannot be a trainee. Temporary status, temporary foreign workers, owners and related parties are all excluded. A different employee may still qualify.
YES → go to step 4.

4. Is that person already receiving government-funded training for the same costs, through Better Jobs Ontario, the Skills Development Fund, or similar? YES → ineligible for the overlapping period. They become eligible once the other program ends.
NO → go to step 5.

5. Is your training provider a third party with an Ontario physical presence, two or more years delivering this training, and one of: a publicly assisted college, university or Indigenous Institute, a District School Board, a registered career college, a union-based training centre, a sector council, or an industry association? NO → find a different provider. This is the second most common cause of a wasted application.
YES → you clear the eligibility gates. Apply before training starts, with 25 or fewer participants and no other OJG application open.

Failed a gate, or cleared it and want to know what else you are missing? Our free two-minute match shows the Ontario and federal programs you actually qualify for right now — including the ones nobody sends you a link to.

Find my matches →

What OJG Covers, and What It Refuses

The exclusion list is where applications die. Read it before you read the eligible-training list.

Here is the test the ministry applies. Training is fundable when an independent, eligible third party delivers it in Ontario, to employees you have named, for a skill they do not currently hold, completed within 52 weeks of the start date. Training is refused when it is something you are already legally obliged to provide, something a vendor is teaching about their own product, something academic rather than occupational, or something that is really an event rather than a course.

Fundable versus refused

Drawn from the eligible and ineligible training rules published on ontario.ca, June 2026.

Typically fundable

✓Trade and technical certifications from a college or registered career college, such as gas technician tickets or equipment operation

✓Professional designations and credential courses delivered by an eligible provider

✓Digital and cloud certifications taught by an independent accredited trainer, not by the software vendor

✓Sector council and industry association training programs, newly named as eligible providers

✓Upskilling an employee who has received a formal notice of layoff, which the ministry lists as a top priority

✓Training a new hire who was previously unemployed, the $15,000 no-contribution case

Refused

✗Training employers are legally required to provide

✗A vendor teaching your staff how to use the vendor's own product or service

✗Executive and preparatory courses: MBA, CFA, LSAT, MCAT, GMAT

✗Conferences, business consulting services, curriculum development

✗Training an apprentice, and any training over one year in length

✗Membership, subscription or association fees, and consultants hired to assist with an OJG application

How Approval Works Now

The most consequential change in the redesign is one sentence long, and it is easy to miss.

Quick answer: OJG is no longer a program where being eligible is the same as being funded. The ministry states that “meeting the requirements does not guarantee funding due to a fixed total program budget”, and that applications are assessed on validity, value for money, and alignment with ministry priorities.

Under COJG the practical experience for most small employers was that a clean, eligible application went through. Under OJG the ministry has written a discretionary layer into the guidelines. Three things are assessed: whether the application and the proposed training are valid, whether the application offers value for money, and whether it aligns with ministry priorities. Past conduct counts too — misuse of funds or misleading information on an earlier application weighs against you, and can make an employer ineligible for future funding outright.

Two stated priorities tell you how to position an application. Highest priority goes to training that helps a trainee into a new or better job, which the ministry explicitly extends to retaining an employee who has received a formal notice of layoff. The second is employers who have not received OJG funding in the past six months. Recent funding does not block you, but it puts you behind — and the ministry notes decisions also depend on current demand and the number of applications in your area.

Verdict

Write the application around the job outcome, not the course. An application that says “this certification moves this employee into a role we cannot currently fill” sits inside the ministry's stated top priority. An application that says “we would like the team to be better at this” does not. Same course, same money, different odds.

Six Ways OJG Applications Fail

Ordered by how often they are self-inflicted. Every one is avoidable before you submit.

Training already started

Training must not have started before the application is submitted. This survived the redesign untouched and it is absolute — applying on the first day of the course is too late. Employers routinely discover it after paying a deposit. Apply as soon as you have the provider and the dates confirmed.

The provider fails the new two-year and presence tests

Under OJG the provider must maintain a physical presence in Ontario throughout the training term, and must have been in the business of providing that specific training for at least two years. A newly launched training arm, or an out-of-province online provider, now fails on a rule that did not exist in 2025. Ask both questions in writing before you build an application around a provider.

The instructor does not meet the credential threshold

Where training is not delivered by a publicly assisted college, university, Indigenous Institute or District School Board, the instructor must have 48 months of relevant experience within the last 10 years, or 24 months plus a Canadian bachelor's degree, a certificate of qualification issued under the Building Opportunities in the Skilled Trades Act, 2021, or graduate status from a recognised institution. Independent trainers usually clear this comfortably but have never been asked to document it.

The trainee is not an eligible trainee

Owners, controlling parties, board members, shareholders and their immediate family are excluded. So are contractors, volunteers, anyone with temporary status in Canada, and anyone already receiving government funding for the same training costs — Better Jobs Ontario and the Skills Development Fund are named explicitly. For a new hire you must supply the signed job offer showing name, job title, employment start date and the trainee's signature.

The training type is on the exclusion list

Legally required training, vendor training on the vendor's own product, MBA, CFA, LSAT, MCAT and GMAT preparation, business consulting, conference attendance, curriculum development, apprentice training, association fees, and anything running over a year. The 2026 additions — apprentice training, curriculum development, membership fees, and consultants hired to help with the application — catch employers working from a 2025 checklist.

A second open application, or an undeclared conflict of interest

You may only submit one OJG application at a time; concurrent applications from one employer are flagged by the ministry and could affect the assessment of both. Separately, employer and training provider must each complete an attestation declaring any actual or perceived conflict of interest between employer, trainee and provider. It is the non-disclosure, not the relationship itself, that sinks the application.

Ontario Job Grant versus Better Jobs Ontario

These two get confused constantly because they fund the same training. They are pointed at different people, and they cannot both pay for the same course.

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Who applies, and for how much
	Ontario Job Grant	Better Jobs Ontario
Who applies	The employer	The individual worker
Who it is for	People you already employ, or a new hire with a signed offer	Laid-off and unemployed people re-entering the workforce
Amount	Up to $10,000 per trainee; up to $15,000 for a previously unemployed new hire at an employer under 100 staff	Up to $28,000 for training of one year or less; up to $35,000 for one to two years
How to apply	OJG online portal, year-round	Through an Employment Ontario service provider
Status	Open	Open

Verdict

If the person already works for you, or you have signed an offer with them, the Ontario Job Grant is your route. If they are unemployed and not yet hired, Better Jobs Ontario is theirs to pursue and it is worth considerably more per person. What you cannot do is run both against the same tuition — a trainee receiving Better Jobs Ontario or Skills Development Fund support for the same costs is an ineligible OJG trainee.

How to Apply

Applications are accepted year-round and assessed on an ongoing basis. The sequence below exists because one document takes far longer than all the rest.

Step 1: Confirm the one-year location rule, then pick the trainee

Before anything else, confirm you have a physical Ontario location where you have been carrying out business for at least a year, then identify a specific employee or a new hire with a signed offer. For a new hire you will need the offer document showing name, job title, employment start date and the trainee's signature.

Step 2: Vet the provider against the two-year and presence tests

Ask the provider three questions in writing: do you maintain a physical presence in Ontario for the whole training term, have you been delivering this specific training for at least two years, and which eligible provider category do you fall under. Colleges, universities, Indigenous Institutes and District School Boards clear this without further checking. Anyone else should be able to answer in one email, and if they cannot, that is your answer.

Step 3: Get a written quote with per-participant pricing

The quote needs course name, start and end dates, hours of instruction, the credential awarded, and cost per participant broken out. A single group total is not enough: the grant is calculated per trainee, so a reviewer cannot process a lump sum.

Step 4: Start the attestation forms early

Employer and training provider each complete an attestation form confirming they meet the requirements, including the conflict-of-interest declaration. The provider's form is consistently the slowest item in the package. Request it the day you decide to apply, not the week you intend to submit.

Step 5: Submit through the OJG portal, before training starts

Apply through the Ontario Job Grant online portal. Old COJG bookmarks and forms no longer apply. Submit only one application at a time, with 25 or fewer participants, and confirm the training has not begun. Every applicant is notified of the outcome, successful or not.

Step 6: Work with your Employment and Training Consultant

Once the ministry confirms receipt you are assigned an Employment and Training Consultant, who becomes your point of contact for everything after submission. Before you apply, general eligibility questions go to [email protected]. Technical problems go to the Employment Ontario Contact Centre at 1-800-387-5656, TTY 1-866-533-6339, or [email protected].

Step 7: Deliver and complete within 52 weeks

Training must be delivered in Ontario by the approved provider, only to the trainees you named, and completed within 52 weeks of the training start date. Keep completion records and invoices — reimbursement documentation is what closes the file.

What to have ready before you open the portal

✓

Proof your Ontario location has been operating for at least one year

Business registration plus something evidencing continuous operation at that address.

✓

Employer attestation form, signed by someone with signing authority

Owner, officer or director level. Includes the conflict-of-interest declaration.

✓

Training provider attestation form, completed by the provider

Allow one to two weeks. You cannot complete it on their behalf.

✓

Training plan or course outline from the provider

Course name, hours, dates, learning objectives, credential awarded, provider category and registration details.

✓

Quote showing cost per participant

Per-head pricing, not a group total.

✓

Trainee list, plus signed job offers for any new hires

Name, job title, employment start date and the trainee's signature on each offer.

✓

WSIB or private disability coverage, and third-party liability insurance details

Employers must maintain and declare appropriate coverage as applicable.

Three Ontario Employers, Three Different Answers

Worked scenarios under the 2026 rules, including the one where the redesign changes the outcome.

If you run a trades business with fewer than 100 staff

Ahmed, HVAC contractor in Mississauga. 32 employees, operating at the same site since 2019. Four technicians need a Gas Technician G1 upgrade at $2,800 each, delivered by a registered Ontario technical training college.

Ahmed is the cleanest case OJG is built for. He clears the one-year location gate easily, his provider is a registered career college that has taught this ticket for years, and the training leads to a credential his technicians do not currently hold. Under 100 employees, his minimum contribution is one-sixth per trainee: about $467 each, with Ontario covering up to $2,333 each. Across four technicians that is roughly $1,867 from Ahmed and up to $9,333 from the province. He applies well before the course starts, with a single application covering all four (comfortably inside the 25-participant limit), and frames it around the commercial work the G1 unlocks — which is exactly the “new or better job” language the ministry says it prioritises.

Outcome: up to $9,333 in OJG funding, roughly $1,867 out of pocket, four certified technicians. The application writes itself because the credential and the job outcome are the same sentence.

If you run a tech company and want cloud certifications

Priya, B2B software director in Toronto. 18 employees. Three developers need cloud architect certifications at $4,200 each to qualify the company for an enterprise contract.

Priya's constraint is not the money, it is the provider. Training delivered by the cloud vendor on its own platform is explicitly ineligible — “training by a vendor on how to use their own product or service” is on the refusal list. She needs an independent Ontario training firm that has been delivering that curriculum for at least two years and maintains a physical Ontario presence throughout the training term, which rules out several of the online-only providers that would have passed under COJG. Once she has an eligible provider the math is simple: at $4,200 per developer her minimum share is $700 each and Ontario covers up to $3,500 each, so up to $10,500 across three developers for about $2,100 from her. The $10,000 ceiling is per trainee, so at $4,200 a head it never comes into play.

Outcome: up to $10,500, about $2,100 out of pocket — but only after switching from vendor-delivered training to an independent, Ontario-present provider with a two-year track record. This is the change most likely to break a plan built in 2025.

If you are hiring someone who is currently unemployed

Maria, private physiotherapy clinic owner in London. 12 employees, clinic open since 2021. Two new hires who were previously unemployed need support-worker certification at $7,500 each from a college continuing education program.

Maria's case is the highest-value use of the program and the least understood. Her clinic has fewer than 100 employees and she is training new hires who were previously unemployed, so each trainee is eligible for up to $15,000 with no minimum employer contribution required — potentially 100% funding. At $7,500 per certification, both sit well inside that ceiling. She needs a signed job offer for each new hire showing name, job title, start date and signature, and the training cannot begin before she applies. Her provider is a publicly assisted college, which clears the provider and instructor tests automatically. One caution worth stating plainly: the no-contribution treatment sits under the “fewer than 100 employees” heading in the guidelines, so a large employer hiring the same two people would be back to a 50/50 split.

Outcome: potentially the full $15,000 of training cost covered, nothing out of pocket beyond wages during training. Most Ontario employers do not know this stream exists.

Beyond the Ontario Job Grant

OJG is one program. Most Ontario employers qualify for several and apply to none.

Training money is rarely the largest thing an Ontario business is leaving on the table. Answer a few questions and we will show you what you actually qualify for right now — and with premium, we draft the application for you.

Find what I qualify for →

If OJG Is Not a Fit

Four training-adjacent programs open to Ontario employers right now. Amounts and status taken from our program catalogue.

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Live alternatives for Ontario employers
Program	Amount	Best for
Ontario Co-operative Education Tax Credit	Refundable tax credit, claimed annually	Hiring students on qualifying co-op placements. Claimed on your corporate return, so there is no application window to miss
Apprenticeship Job Creation Tax Credit	Up to $2,000 per year	Apprentices, whose training OJG now refuses to fund outright
Union Training and Innovation Program	Up to $2M	Union training centres and partnerships investing in trades training equipment and capacity
Indigenous Skills and Employment Training Program	Varies	Indigenous organisations delivering employment and skills training

Ontario also funds plenty outside the training category — regional programs, hiring incentives, sector funds. Our Ontario training grants hub covers the training side in depth and Ontario grants covers the rest. If you are outside Ontario, or comparing provinces, the Canada Job Grant guide tracks every provincial variant and its current status — several have been discontinued or suspended since 2024, so do not assume your province still has one.

Questions People Actually Ask

Is COJG still available?

Not under that name. COJG was paused in November 2025 for a ministry review and did not resume. Ontario relaunched it as the Ontario Job Grant with Application Guidelines effective 1 May 2026, and the old ontario.ca COJG address now redirects to the Ontario Job Grant page. As of the ministry's 26 June 2026 update, the program accepts applications year-round from individual employers whose training involves 25 or fewer participants.

How much does the Ontario Job Grant pay, and what do I contribute?

Up to $10,000 per trainee. Employers with 100 or more employees split training costs 50/50 with the government. Employers with fewer than 100 employees must pay at least one-sixth of each trainee's costs, so Ontario covers up to five-sixths. If an employer with fewer than 100 employees is training a new hire who was previously unemployed, that trainee is eligible for up to $15,000 and no minimum employer contribution is required.

What changed between COJG and OJG?

Five things. Employers must now have a physical Ontario location where they have been carrying out business for at least one year. Training providers need a physical Ontario presence and at least two years delivering that specific training, and instructors must meet stated experience or credential thresholds. Only individual employers with 25 or fewer participants are being accepted, and only one application per employer at a time. And funding is no longer automatic on eligibility — the ministry assesses value for money against a fixed total program budget, prioritising training that leads to a new or better job and employers not funded in the past six months.

Can OJG fund an apprentice, a business owner, or a temporary foreign worker?

No to all three. Training an apprentice is on the ineligible-training list. The employer, and anyone related to, affiliated with, or able to influence the employer — board members, shareholders, and immediate family including spouses, common-law partners, children, parents and siblings — cannot be trainees. Trainees must be Canadian citizens, permanent residents or protected persons living in Ontario; people working in Canada temporarily or holding temporary status are ineligible.

Can I use OJG for online training?

Only if the provider clears the 2026 provider tests. Training must be delivered in Ontario by a third-party provider that maintains a physical presence in Ontario throughout the training term and has been in the business of providing that training for at least two years. That is a meaningful barrier for online-only and out-of-province providers that would have passed under COJG. It does not rule out an online format delivered by an eligible Ontario college or registered career college.

How long do I have to finish the training?

Training must be completed within 52 weeks of the training start date, delivered in Ontario, by the eligible provider, and only to the trainees identified in your application. It must not have started before you applied.

Can I submit more than one application?

Not at the same time. The ministry states employers may only submit one OJG application at a time, and that concurrent applications from an employer will be flagged and could affect the assessment of those applications. Plan training cohorts sequentially rather than filing several applications in parallel.

Who do I contact about an application?

Before applying, email [email protected] with general eligibility or requirement questions. After you apply you are assigned an Employment and Training Consultant, who is your primary point of contact with the ministry. For technical assistance, the Employment Ontario Contact Centre is 1-800-387-5656 toll-free, TTY 1-866-533-6339, or [email protected].

Sources

1. Government of Ontario, Ontario Job Grant program page, updated 26 June 2026. ontario.ca/page/ontario-job-grant. Every eligibility, funding-share, provider, instructor, trainee, priority and timing rule on this page is drawn from it, re-read 31 July 2026. The former COJG address, ontario.ca/page/canada-ontario-job-grant-cojg, redirects there.

2. Government of Ontario, Ontario Job Grant Application Guidelines, effective May 1, 2026. forms.mgcs.gov.on.ca/en/dataset/on00935.

3. Employment Ontario Partners' Gateway, Ontario Job Grant Launch, 4 May 2026 — the notice naming OJG as the redesigned Canada-Ontario Job Grant. eopg.labour.gov.on.ca.

4. Ontario Job Grant online application portal. employmentontario.labour.gov.on.ca/OJG_Online.

5. Government of Ontario, Better Jobs Ontario program page, updated 4 February 2026, for the $28,000 and $35,000 figures. ontario.ca/page/better-jobs-ontario.

6. GrantCompass program catalogue, for the amounts and current status of the alternative programs listed above.