It is one of the most common questions Canadian business owners ask: should we use a .ca or a .com? The answer depends on where your customers are.
How Google treats .ca
A .ca is a country-code domain. Google uses it as a strong signal that a site is targeted at Canada. That helps when Canadians search, and it means you will rarely rank well outside Canada with it. A .com is generic: Google uses other signals, such as language, content, address and links, to decide which country it serves best.
When .ca is the better choice
- You only sell to Canadian customers.
- You are a local or regional business.
- You want to signal to customers that you are Canadian, which many prefer.
Canadians also tend to trust and click .ca domains for local services, which can lift click-through rates in search results.
When .com makes sense
- You sell internationally, or plan to.
- Your brand is already established on a .com.
- You serve both Canada and the United States from one site, with separate sections for each.
If you use a .com for a Canadian business, reinforce Canadian signals: a Canadian address and phone number, prices in CAD, Canadian spelling and content, and links from Canadian websites.
If you own both
Pick one as your main site and permanently redirect (301) the other to it. Do not run two copies of the same site, which splits your authority and creates duplicate content.
Changing domains
Switching an established site from .com to .ca, or the reverse, is a site migration. Done carefully, with every URL redirected and Search Console updated, you can keep most of your rankings. Done carelessly, it can cost months of traffic. See our technical SEO service for how we handle migrations.