TL;DR
Your approved eTA is valid for up to five years from the date it was issued, or until your passport expires, whichever comes first. Eight months after approval is almost certainly fine: but “almost” is the word that matters. The expiry date is on your confirmation, and your passport’s expiry date is the other number you need to check right now. If either has passed, you need a new eTA before you fly.
Your eTA approval does not last forever, even though “approved” feels permanent. Approval and validity are two different dates, and most travellers miss the expiry line entirely on their confirmation. So: if your eTA was approved eight months ago and you’re flying to Canada next month, you very likely still have a valid eTA: but the answer depends on two specific dates that have nothing to do with when you applied.
Read those dates before you book anything else. The sections below show you exactly where to find them and what each one means for your trip. If you’re also wondering whether a new passport affects your existing approval, the article on what to do when your eTA was approved but a new passport was issued is worth a look before you go further.
Approval date versus expiry date: two different things on your confirmation
When you applied, you got an email confirming approval. That email includes your eTA number and, critically, an expiry date. Most people read “approved” and stop there. The expiry line sits a little further down, easy to skim past, and it’s the one that actually controls whether you can board a plane.
An eTA is valid for up to five years, or until the passport it’s linked to expires: whichever of those two dates comes first. That second condition is the one that catches people off guard. If your passport expires in eighteen months, your eTA expires in eighteen months too, regardless of when it was issued. The eTA doesn’t have its own independent clock; it runs on the passport’s clock whenever that clock runs shorter.
So there are two expiry questions, not one:
Has it been more than five years since your eTA was approved? Almost certainly no, if you’re reading this shortly after receiving approval. But if you applied years ago and have been travelling on the same eTA, this is worth confirming.
Does your passport expire before your five-year eTA window closes? This is the more common trap. A passport issued with two years left on it produces an eTA that expires in two years, even though the standard maximum is five. If you’ve since renewed your passport, your old eTA is no longer valid at all. It’s tied to the old document, not to you as a person.
How to find your actual expiry date (where it appears and what it means)
Go back to the original approval email. The expiry date is stated there alongside your eTA number. If you can’t locate that email, you can check the status and expiry date of an existing eTA using the Check your eTA status tool on the Government of Canada’s website. You’ll need your passport details and eTA number, or other information, to use it.
Once you have the expiry date, the check is straightforward: is it after your travel date? If yes, and the passport the eTA is linked to is the same passport you’re travelling on, you’re in good shape.
That second part matters more than it might seem. Airline staff scan your passport at check-in to confirm you have a valid eTA. The scan reads the passport number electronically. If your eTA is linked to an old passport (one you’ve since replaced) the scan won’t find a valid eTA attached to the document in your hand, and you won’t board. It’s also worth confirming that the passport number in your approval email exactly matches the number printed in your current passport. A mismatch, even a single digit, can prevent you from travelling.
For a deeper look at what happens when a new passport enters the picture, the article on what to do when your eTA was approved but a new passport was issued covers that scenario specifically.
What happens if you travel after your eTA expires
An expired eTA is treated the same as no eTA at all. Because the eTA is an entry requirement for visa-exempt travellers arriving by air, the airline will catch this at check-in: the passport scan either returns a valid eTA or it doesn’t. There’s no grace period, no “close enough.” If the expiry date has passed, the eTA isn’t valid and the airline won’t let you board.
This matters for a specific reason: you won’t find out at the Canadian border. You’ll find out at the departure gate in your home country, when it’s too late to do much about it without delaying your trip. The border officer in Canada determines whether you meet all entry requirements when you arrive, but you have to get on the plane first, and the airline controls that step.
One scenario worth knowing about: eTAs can be temporarily suspended under specific government measures. A suspension doesn’t extend the expiry date: the clock keeps running even while the eTA can’t be used. When the suspension lifts, the eTA reactivates automatically without any action needed, but only if it hasn’t expired in the meantime. This is an edge case for most travellers, but it’s a real one.
When your eTA expires before you travel: your only option
There’s no way to extend or renew an existing eTA. If yours has expired, or if it’s linked to a passport you no longer hold, you apply for a new one. That’s the whole process: a fresh application, a new approval, a new expiry date tied to your current passport.
Most applications are approved within minutes. Some take up to 72 hours. Given that timeline, the urgency isn’t usually the processing time. It’s making sure you’ve identified the problem early enough to apply without scrambling. Depending on your situation, a last-minute application may not be possible, so checking your expiry date the moment you book a trip (not the week before you fly) is the move that protects you.
Here’s a summary of the three situations most travellers land in:
| Scenario | eTA still valid? | What you do | Timeline |
|---|---|---|---|
| Approved within the past five years, passport unchanged and not yet expired | Yes, if expiry date is after your travel date | Confirm expiry date in your approval email or via the status tool; travel on the same passport | No action needed beyond confirming |
| Expiry date has passed, or it’s been more than five years since approval | No | Apply for a new eTA | Most approvals arrive within minutes; allow up to 72 hours |
| Approved, but you’ve since been issued a new passport | No, eTA is linked to the old passport | Apply for a new eTA using your new passport details | Most approvals arrive within minutes; allow up to 72 hours |
If your previous application was refused rather than expired, the path forward is different: what happens after a Canada eTA refusal explains that process and what it means for reapplying.
One last thing to keep in mind: a valid eTA lets you travel to Canada as often as you want during its validity period, for short stays normally up to six months at a time. If your current eTA is still valid and your passport is unchanged, you don’t need to do anything: the same approval covers this trip and every trip until the expiry date arrives.
Your approved eTA is good to use as long as its expiry date hasn’t passed and you’re travelling on the same passport it was issued against. Those two conditions, and not the approval date itself, are what determine whether you can fly.