BC PNP Draws in 2026: Minimum Scores by Category

The BC Provincial Nominee Program does not run one queue. You register in the Skills Immigration pool with a score out of 200, and the program holds targeted rounds for the groups it wants: Innovate rounds for TEER 0 to 3 jobs, selected either by a wage threshold or by points; Care rounds for childcare, health, education and veterinary occupations; Build rounds for construction trades; and, in 2026, a one-time initiative for health authority cleaning and security staff in rural and remote communities. Each round sets its own minimum, and invitations go to qualified registrations received before the date of the draw.

Every Skills Immigration stream needs a full-time job offer from an eligible B.C. employer, so the round that can reach you depends on the job as much as the score. Score your registration on the current grid; the calculator keeps the 2026 rounds beside your result, and our PNP service covers the registration and the nomination application.

Wage-based Innovate rounds skip the score and invite every qualified registration at or above a wage threshold. The threshold opened the year at $70 an hour and $145,000 a year on February 4 and has come down since: $55 on August 20, $52 on September 24, and $49 an hour with $99,000 a year on October 29, when 524 registrations were invited. WelcomeBC says future high economic impact rounds may be based on different factors.

Points-based Innovate rounds have stayed in a narrow band: 138 on February 4 and April 22, 132 on August 20, and 131 on September 24 and October 29. The October 29 round invited 248 registrations.

Care: Childcare rounds, for early childhood educators only, went from 115 on May 6 to 99 on September 10 and October 8, when 86 were invited. Care: Health rounds for the priority health occupations went from 108 on May 6 to 76 on September 10 and October 8, with 82 invited in October. Care: Veterinary rounds are small, under five invitations in most of them, with minimums between 72 and 100 this year and 86 on October 8. The one Care: Education round, on August 6, invited fewer than five at 68.

Build: Construction Trades rounds for the priority construction occupations went from 108 on May 6 to 88 on August 6, then 94 on September 10 and October 8, when 115 were invited.

The Temporary Rural/Remote Health Support Initiative, a one-time initiative for up to 250 health authority cleaning and security workers in rural and remote communities, took registrations until October 7 and has invited at 50 on July 23, 60 on September 17 and 54 on October 15, when 16 were invited. Entrepreneur Immigration holds its own rounds; on October 20 the Base stream invited ten registrations and the Regional stream fewer than five, both at a minimum of 118.

On October 6, 2026 the Skills Immigration pool held 7,695 registrations. Only 203 scored 130 or more: 9 at 150 or above, 23 from 140 to 149 and 171 from 130 to 139. That is why a points-based Innovate round at 131 reaches so few. The bulk of the pool sits between 80 and 119: 1,281 registrations from 80 to 89, 1,444 from 90 to 99, 1,426 from 100 to 109 and 1,189 from 110 to 119.

A Care or Build minimum in the 70s or 90s is within reach of thousands of those registrations on score alone, but each of those rounds invites only the occupations it names. A score of 120 looks strong against the Care and Build minimums and sits below every points-based Innovate round this year.

The grid gives up to 40 points each for work experience, education and language, up to 55 for the wage, and up to 25 for where the job is. Wage counts one point per dollar from $16 to $70 an hour, so it is the largest single factor and the one a job change moves most. Jobs in Metro Vancouver earn no area points, Squamish and the Fraser Valley earn 5, and the rest of B.C. 15; the calculator applies the area points and the regional bonus the program guide allows.

B.C. has 6,254 nominations for 2026 after an extra 1,000 arrived in August, and WelcomeBC says it plans to use the full allocation by December 31, 2026. Since the program changes of April 23, 2026, at least 35% of nominations are expected to go to candidates working outside Metro Vancouver. The Skills Immigration application fee rose to $1,750 on January 22, 2026.

A nomination adds 600 points to a CRS score, which clears any Express Entry round; the CRS calculator shows the jump. Whether to register in B.C., build a CRS score, or run both is the question PNP vs Express Entry works through. Candidates outside the Lower Mainland can also look at the three B.C. communities in the Rural Community Immigration Pilot, which runs on its own employer-led process.

Treating the pool score as an invitation, when the round that fits the occupation may be months apart or may never reach that score. Registering before the job offer and the wage are settled, when the wage is most of the score and is checked at the application stage. Expecting a registration submitted on the day of a round to be in it, when invitations go to registrations received before the draw date. In our experience, the registrations that fall over are the ones where the employer or the occupation turns out to be on the ineligible list, which the program said in April 2026 it was expanding.

Your registration score line by line, whether the job and the employer are eligible, which round type can reach you and how soon, whether a move or a wage change would change that, and whether an Express Entry profile should run alongside.