Minimum Wage — Quebec

Quebec sets its own minimum wage by regulation under the Act respecting labour standards (Loi sur les normes du travail, CQLR c N-1.1, art. 40 — referred to throughout this page as the LNT). The general rate as of May 1, 2026 is $16.60 per hour, up from $16.10. Quebec's minimum wage is reviewed annually by the Minister of Labour and almost always adjusts on May 1 — not January 1 like income tax brackets, not October 1 like Ontario's ESA rate. If you started a job in February at $16.10, your stub from your first pay period in May should show $16.60.

• Tipped employees — servers, bartenders, baristas — have a separate, lower minimum wage of $13.30 per hour as of May 1, 2026 (Regulation respecting labour standards, CQLR c N-1.1, r. 3, s. 4). Tips earned belong to the employee and cannot be used to top up the lower base rate beyond the regulated cap. The employer cannot "tip-pool" in a way that diverts your tips to non-tipped staff or to the employer's account (LNT s. 50).
• Domestic workers and home childcare workers are covered by the general minimum wage. Live-in domestic workers no longer have a separate sub-minimum rate — that exemption was repealed in 2017.
• Raspberry, strawberry, and certain other agricultural workers paid by the basket or unit of production have a separate piecework rate set in r. 3 of the Regulation respecting labour standards — but every employer must still ensure that average hourly earnings reach the general minimum.
• The CNESST (Commission des normes, de l'équité, de la santé et de la sécurité du travail) is the single agency that enforces minimum wage, overtimeUnder the federal Fair Labor Standards Act, non-exempt employees must be paid at least 1.5× their regular hourly rate for hours worked beyond 40 in a workweek. State laws can require more generous overtime rules., vacation, holiday pay, pay equity, and workplace health and safety. There is no separate ministry of labour for routine wage complaints — everything goes through CNESST.
• The LNT does not apply to federally regulated workers in Quebec (banks, airlines, telecom, interprovincial transport, federal Crown corporations). Those workers follow the federal Canada Labour Code, with a federal minimum wage of $18.15/hr effective 1 April 2026 (CPI-indexed each April 1).

How the rate gets calculated when you're paid weirdly

LNT s. 40 sets the minimum as a per-hour rate. If you're paid by commission, piece, or a daily flat rate, the test is whether total wages ÷ total hours worked in the pay period equals or exceeds the regulated minimum. A salaried employee on a regular work week is also covered: divide annual salary by 52 weeks, then by the number of hours actually worked, and the answer cannot fall below $16.60 (or $13.30 if tipped). CNESST treats this on a pay-period basis, not averaged across the year, so a slow week cannot be "made up" with a busy week.

What counts as "work" for the wage

LNT s. 57 says you must be paid for any time you are at the employer's disposal. This includes mandatory training, mandatory meetings before or after your shift, time spent waiting for assignments when the employer requires you to remain on site, and short breaks under 30 minutes. A 30-minute meal break is unpaid unless you are required to remain at your workstation. Travel between two work sites during a shift is paid; travel from home to your first site is not.