Digital transformation grants in Canada: what replaced CDAP

Is the Canada Digital Adoption Program (CDAP) still open?

What CDAP paid, for anyone comparing: Boost Your Business Technology gave up to $15,000, covering up to 90% of a digital advisor's plan, and opened the door to a zero-interest BDC loan for businesses with at least $500,000 in revenue: $25,000 to $50,000 below $5 million in revenue, up to $100,000 above it. Grow Your Business Online gave up to $2,400 for selling online. Nothing on this page matches that combination.

Is Digital Main Street still running, and is DMAP the same thing?

Digital Main Street's Ontario Digital Transformation Grant ($2,500 for brick-and-mortar businesses) is closed. Its own application portal says so, after funding more than 3,800 main street businesses. Digital Main Street itself is still running: free digital onboarding with a personalized to-do list, workshops, a directory of digital providers and the DMS Squad, which helps owners work through their recommendations. There is no money attached any more.

DMAP is a different program. It is the Digital Modernization and Adoption Plan from the Ontario Centre of Innovation, and it is open. It is covered in the Ontario section below.

Who received CDAP money, by province

Federal proactive disclosure lists every Boost Your Business Technology grant ISED signed. We pulled all of them on October 4, 2026: 29,775 grants worth $433.8 million, with agreement start dates from March 31, 2022 to March 19, 2025. 82% were for the full $15,000. The dates run a year past the February 2024 cutoff because they record when each agreement started, not when the business applied. Alberta, a frequent search, had 4,419 of them. There was never a separate Alberta version of CDAP, and Alberta has no successor of its own.

Method: Proactive Disclosure of Grants and Contributions (open.canada.ca), program "Canadian Digital Adoption Program Boost your Business Technology Stream", one row per agreement (none were amended), one 2013-dated data-entry row dropped. What it cannot see: Grow Your Business Online grants, which were paid through delivery partners, plus the BDC loans and youth wage subsidies. That is why ISED's own total of 71,000 businesses is larger. Contains information licensed under the Open Government Licence – Canada.

What replaced CDAP? The options compared

Nothing replaced it one for one. CDAP did three jobs, and each one now lives somewhere different:

• The paid digital plan survives in two provinces: Ontario's DMAP and Quebec's ESSOR 1B. Manufacturers anywhere can get a smaller plan grant for AI through NGen.
• The zero-interest loan has a commercial successor. BDC's own CDAP page now points visitors to LIFT, which combines BDC consulting and financing at a preferential rate. It is a loan you repay, not a grant.
• Money for building software, through SR&ED and NRC IRAP, was never part of CDAP and is still there.

"Open" means the funder's page said it was accepting applications when we checked on October 4, 2026. First-come programmes can close without notice when money runs out.

How many Canadian programmes pay for software, websites or digital tools?

We read the eligible and ineligible expense lists of all 887 programmes in our catalogue that are not closed or discontinued, as of October 4, 2026. 172 of them pay toward a business's own digital costs. But only 16 are government grants that pay to plan or buy digital tools and are open to any eligible business in their province or territory.

Most of the 172 are narrower than they look. 58 are limited to one industry (manufacturing, agriculture, tourism, culture, ocean, space), 26 are reserved for a group such as Indigenous, women, Black, newcomer, youth or francophone entrepreneurs, 12 serve one city or region, 6 are only for exporters or businesses hit by tariffs, and 5 are company-funded contests. That leaves 65 open to any eligible business.

What the table says. In British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and New Brunswick, every provincial grant for digital tools is limited to one industry, group or city; none is open to every business. Across Canada, the money to buy digital tools is mostly borrowed: 19 national loans list technology or software as an eligible use, and no national grant open to everyone does. The North and PEI have the most grants per business, though they are small. One territorial programme, CanNor's NIEOP, covers all three territories, and Yukon's TYDA counts as between intakes because its current round is full.

Method: a text search for digital costs (software, website, e-commerce, ERP, CRM, point of sale, cloud, cybersecurity, automation, AI, IT hardware) in each programme's eligible expenses, then every match read by hand and sorted by what it pays for and who can apply. 59 matches were dropped because the digital cost was not the business's own (overhead, building energy controls, college research, events, non-profit streams), because a funder's page contradicted our record, or because one record repeats another; 5 cloud-credit offers from tech companies are not counted. Statuses come from our catalogue (128 active, 42 between intakes, 2 upcoming among the 172). Scripts and data: catalogue_slice.py and adjudicate.py in our rebuild notes.

What digital funding is there in my province?

Federal programmes (SR&ED, NRC IRAP, BDC, Mitacs) work the same everywhere. What differs is the provincial layer, and that is where a business buying software or a website has to look first.

Is there a digital grant in Ontario? DMAP, RMPG and TDP

Yes, and Ontario has the most complete set. The Ontario Centre of Innovation's Digital Competence Centre runs three streams, checked on its page on October 4, 2026:

• DMAP (Digital Modernization and Adoption Plan): up to $15,000 toward a custom plan written by an approved Digital Adoption Consultant, for Ontario for-profit businesses with 1 to 499 employees. Open, first come, first served while funds last. The plan must cover your current systems, at least three digital options with their benefits, an implementation roadmap with costs, the skills you will need and the likely return.
• RMPG (Retail Modernization Project Grant): up to $5,000 non-repayable for POS systems, RFID scanners and inventory software, and CRM tools. For storefront businesses that sell to the public: shops, restaurants, salons, florists. 1 to 50 full-time staff, incorporated and operating at least a year, $100,000 or more in revenue, and not home-based. Open.
• TDP (Technology Demonstration Program): up to $50,000 to implement what a DMAP recommends, for businesses with at least $750,000 in revenue. Currently closed for applications.

You can apply to DMAP or RMPG, not both. For the people side, the Ontario Job Grant pays up to $10,000 per trainee for training by an outside provider. In southern Ontario, FedDev Ontario says it is accepting applications from businesses adopting new technology; our catalogue records its Business Scale-up and Productivity funding as repayable. More: Ontario digital grants and Ontario technology grants.

Does government funding pay for custom software, ERP or PIM integration?

It depends on one question: are you building something, or buying it? Programmes that fund building pay for development wages and will not pay for a licence. Programmes that fund buying will not pay your developers. Most real projects have both, so split the budget into build lines and buy lines before you apply to anything.

What about integrating an ERP, a PIM like Akeneo, or a CRM?

Configuring and integrating a commercial system is buying, however hard the project is. The programmes that paid for it on October 4, 2026 are ESSOR 1C in Quebec (after a 1B plan), BDC LIFT as a loan (its digital track names ERP and CRM systems and data infrastructure), and the Alberta Manufacturing Productivity Grant for manufacturers. Ontario's TDP would fit, but it is closed. SR&ED applies only to the part of an integration that needed new technical work, such as a method that standard tools and documentation could not deliver. Keep separate records for that part from day one.

Are there grants for web development? What web designers and IT vendors can tell clients

There is no national grant for websites any more. CDAP's Grow Your Business Online micro-grant was the last one, and it closed on September 30, 2024. As of October 4, 2026, a client's website can be funded in PEI (Web Presence Assistance, or the Small Business Assistance Program for a first site), in the Northwest Territories (ADAPT), as a small part of DMAP or RMPG in Ontario, or through narrower programmes for one industry or group. Our guide to e-commerce and website grants lists them.

If you sell websites, software or IT services, these are the funder rules that most often trip up an application you help with:

• Ontario DMAP. The consultant who writes the plan must be approved by OCI, based in Ontario, and give vendor-neutral advice. A technology vendor selling a particular product or software cannot be the consultant. Commissions or referral deals on the software recommended must be disclosed, and the consultant who writes a client's DMAP cannot be the vendor on that client's OCI-funded implementation project. Each consultant firm is limited to five client engagements under the current round.
• PEI Web Presence Assistance. The application needs a written quote from an arm's-length web developer, or an itemized cost list if the owner builds the site. It must be submitted before any financial or legal commitment, a business funded for a website in the last two years cannot reapply, and recurring advertising is not covered.
• Yukon TYDA. Deals between a recipient and a provider that are not at arm's length are ineligible, a redesign of an existing site is not covered, and past CDAP recipients cannot apply.
• Ontario Job Grant. Training by a vendor on its own product is ineligible. The trainer must be an outside provider with a physical presence in Ontario and at least two years of delivering that training.
• B.C. Employer Training Grant. Employers must apply themselves with their Business BCeID; third parties cannot apply on their behalf.
• ESSOR 1B. Costs incurred before the application is filed, including anything already committed by contract, are not eligible, and neither are the business's own internal costs.
• BDC LIFT. Preferential terms apply when the technology is supplied or integrated by Canadian suppliers.

Can I get a wage subsidy or a training grant for a digital project?

Yes, and this is often the easiest money in a digital project, because it is not tied to what you buy. A student or graduate researcher can do the work, and training grants cover teaching your staff the new system.

More: wage subsidies and hiring programmes and training grants for employers.

GrantCompass is an independent funding database, not a government office. Some features are paid, including the one below.

What has changed: the state of play on October 4, 2026

• OCI TDP is closed. Ontario's $50,000 implementation stream shows "Currently Closed for Applications"; DMAP and RMPG are open.
• New rules for Ontario's DMAP consultants (April 2026): a cap of five engagements per consultant firm, conflict-of-interest disclosure, and no technology vendors.
• Manitoba's Innovation Growth Program reached its intake deadline on September 30, 2026. It funds commercializing new products and excludes software prototypes, so it was never a digital-adoption grant.
• Nova Scotia's Tourism Digital Assistance Program is closed for 2026-27.
• Yukon's TYDA e-commerce micro-grant is fully subscribed.
• ADRIQ's Trans Num in Quebec required projects to be finished by March 31, 2026.
• NGen's Industrial AI Readiness Program wants final reports by the end of December 2026.
• TECHNATION Career Ready no longer pays a higher subsidy for students from under-represented groups; it still reserves at least half of its placements for them.
• The CDAP website is gone. Its address now forwards to the ISED home page, and BDC's CDAP page points to LIFT.

Questions

How to fund a digital project, step by step

1. Split build from buy. Put development work in one budget line and licences, hardware, consultants and training in others. Each programme pays for one side only.
2. Get the plan funded first, where you can. DMAP in Ontario, ESSOR 1B in Quebec, NGen's AI readiness plan for manufacturers. The plan is what later implementation money asks for.
3. Apply before you sign or spend. PEI and ESSOR refuse costs committed before the application, and NRC IRAP starts with an advisor conversation before any funding.
4. Fund the people separately. A training grant or a student wage subsidy sits beside any of the above, because it pays for different costs.