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A .ca domain requires meeting one of the Canadian Presence Requirements set by CIRA, the registry that runs the extension. The common routes are Canadian citizenship, permanent residence, or a company incorporated federally or in a province. Registration goes through a CIRA-certified registrar rather than the registry directly.
This is a plain-language summary, not legal advice. Rules change and thresholds get revised, so confirm anything you are relying on against the regulator's own page.
There are around eighteen eligible categories. Most businesses qualify through incorporation in Canada, or through an owner who is a citizen or permanent resident. Partnerships, trade unions, associations, educational institutions, hospitals, and Indigenous Peoples in Canada each have their own category.
A foreign company with a trademark registered in Canada can register a .ca, but only a domain that exactly matches the registered mark. It cannot pick up descriptive or city-based domains on that basis. Eligibility also has to be maintained: losing the qualifying status can mean losing the domain.
For a business serving Canadian customers, yes, as a signal rather than as a ranking factor. A .ca reads as local to Canadian buyers and cannot be quietly acquired by a foreign competitor. The usual arrangement is to own both, run the site on one, and redirect the other permanently so there is only ever one indexed version.
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