There are two different things people mean by “Amazon FBA Canada,” and confusing them is the expensive mistake. Route one is Remote Fulfillment with FBA: your existing US FBA inventory fills Amazon.ca orders, nothing crosses the border until a customer buys, and Amazon’s own page states that “Customers pay any import duties, taxes, and fees as the importer of record” (sell.amazon.com, data checked 2026-08-22). Route two is real FBA in Canada: you ship inventory into Canadian fulfillment centres yourself, become the importer of record for that shipment, and pay Canadian FBA fulfillment fees on every unit. Same three letters, different customs posture, different landed cost. This guide puts the two side by side using only what Amazon publishes — and says plainly where it publishes nothing.
The Two Routes, Side by Side
Amazon’s Sell in Canada page states the options plainly: “Use Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA) to sell domestically within Canada, or export inventory to Amazon fulfillment centers in Canada if you’re located in another country,” and “If you’re located outside Canada, use Remote Fulfillment with FBA to sell in Canada without sending inventory across the border” (sell.amazon.com, data checked 2026-08-22). For a US seller that collapses to two: keep your stock where it is, or commit stock to Canada.
| Remote Fulfillment with FBA | Real FBA inventory in Canada | |
|---|---|---|
| Where stock sits | Your existing US FBA inventory | Canadian fulfillment centres |
| Border crossing | Per order, when a customer buys | Up front, as a commercial import you arrange |
| Who pays import duties and taxes | The customer, “as the importer of record” (Amazon, checked 2026-08-22) | You, as the importer bringing goods in |
| Listing creation | Build International Listings replicates eligible US offers | You create or import offers on Amazon.ca |
| Prime | “Prime customers receive free shipping to Canada, Mexico, and Brazil” (Amazon, checked 2026-08-22) | Standard Amazon.ca Prime from local stock |
| Fees Amazon charges | Referral fee of the marketplace where the sale happens | Amazon.ca referral fee plus Canadian FBA fulfillment fees |
| Inventory risk | None added — one pooled US pool | Split pool; stranded units are stranded in Canada |
The row that decides most cases is the duties row. Under Remote Fulfillment the customs cost lands on the buyer at delivery: your Amazon.ca price is not carrying it, but the customer’s total is higher than the price they saw — a conversion variable, not a line on your settlement report. Under real Canadian FBA you absorb duty once, in bulk, before anything sells, and the listed price is the price the buyer pays.
Your Account: North America Unified vs. Canada-Only
Most US sellers do not need a new account. Amazon states it directly: “If you already sell on Amazon.com with a Professional selling account, you can use your existing North America and Brazil unified account to start selling in Canada” (sell.amazon.com, data checked 2026-08-22).
Two details in that sentence get dropped in most write-ups. First, the unified account spans North America and Brazil — not just the US, Canada and Mexico. Second, it is tied to a Professional selling account; if you are on an Individual plan the unified-account path is not what Amazon is describing. If you are unsure which plan you are on, our breakdown of Individual vs. Professional covers where that line falls.
On company formation, Amazon’s Canada page says one thing and one thing only: “If you’re a business outside Canada, you may not be required to form a Canada-based company to sell your products in Canada” (data checked 2026-08-22). Note the hedge — may not be required. Amazon is not telling you that you have no Canadian obligations; it is telling you that incorporating there is not automatically one of them.
The Monthly Fee Is the First Real Fork
This is the number most articles get half right. Amazon’s Sell in Canada page publishes two: “If you use a North American and Brazil unified account to sell in Canada, the US, Mexico, and Brazil, your monthly fee will be USD 39.99 per month,” and “If you use a Canada account to sell exclusively in Canada, you’ll pay CAD 29.99 per month” (data checked 2026-08-22).
| Account structure | Professional subscription |
|---|---|
| North America and Brazil unified account | USD 39.99 per month |
| Amazon.ca-only selling account | CAD 29.99 per month |
The CAD 29.99 figure is the one that circulates on its own, and quoted alone it misleads US sellers. If you already run a Professional account on Amazon.com, opening Canada adds no subscription — the USD 39.99 you already pay covers the unified marketplaces. CAD 29.99 is what a seller who is not on Amazon.com pays. Getting this backwards makes Canada look like a new fixed cost when for most US sellers it is not one.
Referral fees are separate from the subscription and they follow the sale. The Remote Fulfillment page states that “sellers will pay the Remote Fulfillment with FBA costs and the category referral fee for the store where the sale occurred,” and the Canada page states that “Referral fees vary by product category. For every item sold, you’ll pay a percentage of the total price or a minimum amount, whichever is greater” — neither page publishes the Canadian category percentages (data checked 2026-08-22). Referral fee mechanics work as they do on Amazon.com — see our referral fee guide — then read the Canadian rates from Seller Central, not from any article.
Who Pays the Duties, and Why It Changes Your Pricing
Under Remote Fulfillment, Amazon says it twice: “Customers pay for the import duties and taxes on items bought through Remote Fulfillment with FBA,” and, more pointedly, “Customers pay any import duties, taxes, and fees as the importer of record” (data checked 2026-08-22). Importer of record is a legal role, not a billing note, and it reshapes three decisions.
Your price ceiling. Because the buyer settles customs, the Amazon.ca price you show is not carrying duty. That makes Remote Fulfillment listings look competitive on the page while the buyer’s true total is higher. Against a Canadian competitor holding local stock, your listing price can win and your conversion can still lose.
Your returns math. Duty already paid by the buyer is not something your refund automatically restores. Model Canadian returns as costlier per unit than the same SKU coming back to a US warehouse.
Your customer messaging. Buyers who did not expect a customs charge at the door often treat it as a seller problem. Nothing in Amazon’s page removes that friction; it only assigns the cost.
Real Canadian FBA inverts all three: you pay import costs once, on a commercial shipment, and from then on it is a domestic order. Remote Fulfillment has near-zero setup and pushes cost to the buyer; local inventory has real setup cost and a clean domestic price.
How Your Canadian Listings Get Created
You do not hand-build a Canadian catalogue. Amazon: “Start selling quickly using the Build International Listings tool, which replicates your eligible US offers and lists them in the destination stores.” The same tool “synchronizes your prices to preserve your profit margins while adjusting for differences in fulfillment costs, referral fees, and currency exchange rates” (data checked 2026-08-22). Read that list closely — it adjusts for fulfillment costs, referral fees and exchange rates. Import duties are not in it, because on this route the customer carries them. On eligibility, Amazon states a product must “Be enabled for FBA in the US and have valid offers in Canada, Mexico, or Brazil” and “Meet all trade compliance and destination-country regulations” (data checked 2026-08-22).
To enroll: “Hover over Inventory in the Seller Central main menu and select Remote Fulfillment with FBA” (data checked 2026-08-22). That screen sits behind a seller login, so this guide describes where it is rather than showing it — and your Build International Listings price rules live on the same logged-in side.
Coverage is wider than Canada. The Remote Fulfillment page lists Canada, Mexico and Brazil — Amazon.ca, Amazon.com.mx and Amazon.com.br (data checked 2026-08-22). If Canada works for a SKU, the same US inventory can reach two more marketplaces without a second logistics project.
Remote Fulfillment Is Not FBA Export
These two programs get merged constantly and they are structurally different.
- FBA Export: the customer buys on amazon.com, and Amazon ships your US FBA unit to their international address. There is no separate foreign listing. Most FBA sellers are enrolled by default — see Amazon FBA Export.
- Remote Fulfillment with FBA: an offer is created on Amazon.ca (or .com.mx / .com.br) via Build International Listings, the customer shops on their own local marketplace in their own currency, and the unit still ships from your US FBA stock.
The difference that matters commercially: Remote Fulfillment puts you in front of shoppers who never visit amazon.com, in local search results, competing on the local Buy Box. FBA Export only captures demand that already found your US listing. They are not alternatives — you can be in both — but only one of them makes you visible in Canada.
The same local-stock-versus-remote-shipping trade-off runs through Europe — see Pan-EU FBA vs. EFN — and the freight side of moving inventory into a foreign Amazon network is covered in Amazon Global Logistics.
What This Guide Will Not Tell You
Two categories of number are missing from this page on purpose.
Canadian FBA fulfillment fee rates. The Amazon.ca fee schedule — per-unit rates by size tier and weight band, plus Canadian storage rates — sits inside Seller Central behind a seller login (checked 2026-08-22), not on Amazon’s public seller pages. This guide will not reprint a Canadian fee table sourced from a blog, a freight forwarder or a calculator page: fee tables get revised, and a number copied from a secondary source and stamped with an authoritative-sounding date is worse than no number. Read it from the fee schedules on your Amazon.ca marketplace, filtered to your SKU’s size tier, then drop those rates into the arithmetic in FBA fees and profit.
Anything about GST/HST. Amazon’s Sell in Canada page addresses non-resident sellers with exactly one sentence — the “may not be required to form a Canada-based company” line quoted above — and carries no GST/HST registration guidance anywhere on the page (data checked 2026-08-22). Amazon’s public page does not resolve your GST/HST position, and that question belongs to a cross-border accountant, not to an article.
Similarly, Amazon’s Remote Fulfillment page names “the Remote Fulfillment with FBA costs” as something sellers pay, but states no dollar amount anywhere on that page (checked 2026-08-22). Any Canadian digital-services-tax percentage you see quoted in seller articles is likewise unsourced as far as Amazon’s public seller pages go.
How to Decide
Work down this list in order; the first “no” usually settles it.
- Do you have a Professional account on Amazon.com? If yes, Canada costs you no new subscription — the unified account covers it. If no, opening Canada means a subscription decision first.
- Are your SKUs FBA-enabled in the US with active offers? Remote Fulfillment requires it. Anything FBM-only or out of stock is not eligible.
- Do any of your SKUs carry restrictions? Products must “Meet all trade compliance and destination-country regulations” — check hazmat, batteries and regulated categories against Canadian rules before assuming they replicate.
- Can your margin survive a buyer-paid duty at the door? If your category is price-sensitive and the customs charge lands as a surprise, Remote Fulfillment’s conversion penalty may exceed its setup savings.
- Do you have proven Canadian demand? Remote Fulfillment is the cheap way to find out. Committing inventory before you have Amazon.ca sales history buys a split inventory pool on a hypothesis.
The standard sequence: turn on Remote Fulfillment, let Amazon.ca generate real order data on your US stock, and move inventory into Canada only once a specific SKU’s volume makes the import project worth it. Delivery-window rules also touch cross-border promises — see the 7-day delivery window.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I need a separate Amazon seller account to sell in Canada?
Not if you already sell on Amazon.com with a Professional account. Amazon’s page states you can use your existing North America and Brazil unified account to start selling in Canada (data checked 2026-08-22). A separate Amazon.ca-only account exists at CAD 29.99 per month, but a US Professional seller does not need it.
Who pays import duties under Remote Fulfillment with FBA?
Amazon’s Remote Fulfillment page states: “Customers pay any import duties, taxes, and fees as the importer of record” (data checked 2026-08-22). The buyer settles customs charges; they are not built into the price shown on your Amazon.ca listing.
Does Remote Fulfillment cover marketplaces other than Canada?
Yes. Amazon’s page lists Canada, Mexico and Brazil — Amazon.ca, Amazon.com.mx and Amazon.com.br — all served from your existing US FBA inventory (data checked 2026-08-22).
What does Amazon FBA cost in Canada per unit?
Amazon does not publish Canadian FBA fulfillment rates on its public seller pages; the fee schedule sits inside Seller Central on the Amazon.ca marketplace (checked 2026-08-22). This guide deliberately does not reprint per-unit Canadian FBA rates from third-party sources.
Do I need to register for GST/HST?
Amazon’s public Sell in Canada page does not answer this. It says only that a business outside Canada “may not be required to form a Canada-based company” (data checked 2026-08-22). Registration obligations for non-resident sellers are a question for a cross-border accountant.
The Bottom Line
For a US Professional seller, opening Canada is neither a new subscription nor a new logistics project: Remote Fulfillment with FBA replicates eligible US offers onto Amazon.ca and ships from stock you already hold, with the buyer covering import duties and taxes as importer of record. Real FBA inventory in Canada is a separate, later decision — a clean domestic price and a local delivery promise, bought with an import project and a split inventory pool. The two numbers that decide it, Canadian per-unit fulfillment fees and your GST/HST position, are exactly the two Amazon does not publish openly. Get them from Seller Central and from an accountant, in that order.