Express Entry Draw 343: 421 PNP Candidates Issued Invitations

Key Takeaways for Express Entry Candidates

• Type of draw: Provincial Nominee Program
• Invitations issued: 421
• CRS score: 727
• Tie-breaking rule: September 09, 2024 at 17:11:19 UTC
• Prediction for the next draw: Canadian Experience Class draw on April 29, 2025.

Our Analysis of This PNP Express Entry Draw

Today’s PNP-specific Express Entry draw invited just 421 candidates with a minimum CRS score of 727. This is the smallest PNP draw we’ve had in 2025, and it’s in fact the smallest PNP draw since January 5, 2022 where just 392 PNP candidates were invited. With this draw, the total number of ITAs issued to PNP applicants in 2025 now stands at 4,079.

Despite the relatively small number of people being invited in this round, there was a decrease in the CRS score for this round. The past two rounds saw CRS cut-offs for the PNP rounds sitting at 736 on March 17 and 764 on April 14. Both of these rounds were larger, indicating that since the April 14 draw, there have been fewer candidates joining the Express Entry pool with a provincial nomination with higher scores (compared to previous weeks this year).

Another noteworthy finding from this draw is that we have seen the number of candidates in the pool with a PNP nomination grow by several hundred, to 416 candidates in the pool with a score of 601+. Over the first few months, we generally saw the pool drop to a very small number of candidates after each PNP round. So we will keep an eye on any trends there. (Though, we don’t expect the 601+ pool to grow to huge volumes, given that nomination numbers are limited at the provincial level.)

The takeaway for those in the pool with the 600 point boost for provincial nomination is that the nomination alone does not guarantee an invitation. It’s still worthwhile working on your Comprehensive Ranking System score to boost your odds of receiving an invitation sooner.

How Does The Provincial Nominee Program Work Under Express Entry?

If you’re not familiar with Canada’s Express Entry system, it’s an application management system used to manage economic immigrants to Canada. The benefits of the Express Entry system are that it offers streamlined application timelines for people who are ranked highly and invited to apply for permanent residence. After you receive an invitation and submit your application, it usually  takes IRCC around 6 months to make a decision. This is much faster than other pathways to permanent residence — like family sponsorship, which takes around 24 months as of April 28, 2025.

• Keen to learn more about Express Entry? Check out our dedicated Express Entry page.

With that in mind, the Provincial Nominee Program is a program that’s offered at the provincial level but then managed and approved at the federal level. Some PNPs require you to be eligible for Express Entry, so they can be inter-related, but there are also PNPs that allow you to immigrate even if you don’t qualify for Express Entry.

Learn more about Canada’s PNPs via our PNP Tracker, which comes with a range of tools, including a stream finder. You’ll need to sign up for our free account to access these helpful tools, so if you want to skip straight to those — sign up here.

You can also sign up for up-to-date information about Express Entry draws via your free Moving2Canada account. Just subscribe to our newsletter for news about the draws and our analysis as it happens, so you’ll never miss the latest results. This can be a powerful tool to help you identify trends and map your pathway to permanent residence in Canada.