Canadian Side Hustle Report Finds Side Gigs Going Full-Time

Side hustles in Canada have moved past pocket money. Side work keeps getting more common, and the 2026 Canadian side hustle report, released on October 8, shows that nearly one-quarter of Canadians now earn income through work on the side, while 47% either run a side hustle or want to start one. The report comes from Ownr, the business registration platform owned by RBC, and is based on an Ipsos survey of 1,501 Canadians aged 18 and older conducted in September. The picture it paints is one of extra work slowly turning into something closer to a main job.

The release was timed for Small Business Month, and Ownr says it wanted to measure the gap between Canadians' entrepreneurial ambition and their confidence in making a business official. More than 250,000 Canadians have launched a business through the Ownr platform, the company says, and the survey suggests the pipeline of future founders is filling fast.

Money is the main driver, plain and simple. According to the survey, 39% of side hustlers started one to supplement their regular income (a pattern seen in recent US survey data too), 33% pointed to the rising cost of living, and 26% wanted to pay down debt. Not every reason is about bills, though. About 21% said they wanted to turn a hobby or skill into income, while 12% were after more flexibility and control over how they work.

For a growing share of hustlers, the side gig is not staying on the side. The report found that 19% of current side hustlers are likely to leave their job and pursue the venture full-time, and 22% said their side hustle already generates enough income that they do not need a regular job.

The trend runs strongest with Gen Z. More than half of Gen Z side hustlers, 55%, consider what they are doing a real business, 29% said they are likely to pursue it full-time, and 31% said the income already covers their needs. Separate RBC data found that 46% of Gen Z business owners hold both a full-time job and a side hustle at the same time.

The 13-hour week

The main thing standing in the way is time. Finding hours between a job and life obligations was named as the biggest challenge by 28% of side hustlers, who spend an average of 13 hours a week on their venture. A quarter of respondents said preventing burnout and protecting work-life balance was their main struggle, and a similar share said they simply did not know where to start.

That time squeeze helps explain why plenty of ventures stall before they grow. Hustlers are fitting client work, product orders, or content schedules around full-time jobs, family, and sleep, and the Canadian side hustle report suggests the breaking point often arrives long before the business does. The same strain shows up across platform gig work, where flexibility rarely comes without a cost.

The paperwork problem

Confidence drops again when the side hustle has to become official. More than a third of side hustlers, 37%, do not know when they need to register their business, and 38% said they do not understand the legal requirements that apply to them. The gap is wider for women: 58% said they know when registration is required, compared with 69% of men, while 67% said they understand their tax obligations, versus 74% of men. On legal requirements generally, fewer than six in ten women felt confident, against roughly two-thirds of men.

Ownr chief executive Jordan Casey described the typical path as a slow realization: extra income first, then the discovery that the work could become a real business. His advice for people weighing the leap, the report says, comes down to three things. First, know the income and profitability milestones that would justify a change, since those are the two biggest signals hustlers watch before going full-time. Second, understand when registration and tax obligations kick in, and whether incorporation makes sense. Third, decide what growth actually looks like for them, because going full-time is not the only way to win.

The findings come from an Ipsos online survey conducted on behalf of Ownr in early September, and were independently covered by Canadian SME magazine, which confirmed the headline figures. The sample was weighted to match census figures, with a credibility interval of plus or minus 3.1 percentage points. Questions asked only of side hustlers drew on a subsample of 834 respondents, with a credibility interval of plus or minus 4.2 points. The full results are available in the report release.