For American citizens

As a student

At home in the US

One cross-border rule reaches you even if you never cross anything: since the 2024 TSA rule, every US flight training provider must verify the citizenship of every student, Americans included, and keep a record of it for five years. So when a CFI asks for your passport or birth certificate at the first lesson, that's a federal requirement they're meeting, not nosiness. Bring the document; it takes a minute.

Training in Canada

Getting in is the easy part. A program of six months or less needs no study permit at all, as long as you finish it within your authorized stay (normally six months as a visitor). Anything longer needs a study permit, and a permit can only be sponsored by a school on Canada's Designated Learning Institution list. A freelance instructor can't sponsor one, so a long program means a school, full stop.

There's no citizenship bar. Canada will happily issue you a Canadian licence. The structural difference to plan around: paid training toward a recreational permit or private licence runs through a certificated flight training unit, a school, unless you or a family member own the training aircraft. Past the private licence the field opens up: commercial and instructor-rating training can be freelance in an aircraft obtained at arm's length from the instructor (who files a notice with Transport Canada), and ratings, reviews, and checkouts are freelance territory everywhere.

Making your American paper count

Under the FAA and Transport Canada licensing agreement, your private, commercial, or ATP certificate converts to the Canadian equivalent with paperwork, a Canadian air-law exam, and in some cases limited checking; most class, instrument, night, and type ratings carry over. Transport Canada also credits your logged time and training toward Canadian licences on review of your logbook. Two things don't travel: medicals (you'll need a Canadian aviation medical for a Canadian licence) and, if you're an instructor, the instructor rating, which is covered below.

As an instructor

At home in the US: FTSP applies to you, full stop

The Flight Training Security Program binds every FAA flight training provider, independent CFIs included, even one whose students are all US citizens. The standing obligations: an account on the FTSP portal, TSA security awareness training with a refresher every 24 months, verifying and recording every student's citizenship, and keeping training records for five years, open to TSA inspection.

Foreign students add a per-student routine, but a narrower one than the old program's reputation suggests. Vetting is only triggered by training toward an initial certificate, an instrument rating, a multiengine rating, or a type rating. Flight reviews, IPCs, ground training, and discovery flights trigger nothing. When vetting does apply: the student gets their own five-year Determination of Eligibility through the portal, you confirm it before training, notify TSA of the training event, and photograph the student on arrival. Canadians get no shortcut; they're vetted like everyone else.

Teaching in Canada

Credentials. The licensing agreement converts pilot certificates but never instructor ratings, in either direction. To instruct toward Canadian licences you earn the Canadian instructor rating: the course and the flight test (your FAA instructing hours do now count toward its experience requirements, as of the December 2025 rule change). Expect the Canadian structure on top: recreational and private students generally come through a flight training unit, owner-aircraft training excepted, and new (Class 4) instructors work under supervision.

What you can do on FAA paper. Your FAA CFI certificate isn't geographic. You can give training that counts toward FAA certificates while physically in Canada, in an appropriately operated N-registered aircraft, and sign the FAA endorsements that go with it. What you can't do is touch the Canadian system with it: no instruction toward Canadian licences, and no instructing in C-registered aircraft without Canadian paperwork.

Work authorization. Teaching paying customers in Canada is work, and US citizenship gets you in as a visitor, not into the labor market. Before taking Canadian customers on Canadian soil, talk to an immigration professional about a work permit; the aviation paperwork and the immigration paperwork are entirely separate stacks and you need both.

Whose rules apply in the cockpit

The aircraft registry decides. An N-registered aircraft follows FAA rules and a C-registered one follows Canadian rules, whichever side of the border it sits on. Instructors who hold both countries' credentials get the clean version: FAA training in N-registered aircraft, Canadian training in C-registered, anywhere.