CNE Tickets 2026: Prices, $13 Nights, Ride Passes & Where to Buy
- General admission is $26.55, seniors and children 5 to 13 are $22.12, and children four and under get in free with a paying adult. Those figures are before HST, and online there is a $2.99 per-ticket processing fee on top.
- The $13 nights are not a general evening discount. They run on eight specific dates only — 24 to 27 August and 31 August to 3 September — and the online link is switched on at 4.45pm on each of those days.
- $13 is one of the few prices that already includes HST, along with Kid’s Toonie Monday at $2 and the EXcelunch at $30. Most other prices on the page do not.
- A Ride All Day Pass at $75.22 includes grounds admission. A ride-only pass is $55 but does not, and it can only be bought on site — so the cheaper one is not always the cheaper one.
The 2026 Canadian National Exhibition runs from 21 August to 7 September at Exhibition Place in Toronto. Below is every ticket price the fair publishes, which days admission drops to $13, and the two lines of small print that change what you actually pay.
How much are CNE tickets in 2026?
General admission is $26.55, before tax. Seniors and children pay the same discounted rate as each other, and under-fives are free.
| Ticket | Who | Price |
|---|---|---|
| General Admission | 14 to 64 years | $26.55 |
| 65 & Better Admission | 65 years+ | $22.12 |
| Child Admission | 5 to 13 years | $22.12 |
| Family Pass | 2 adults and 2 children, or 1 adult and 3 children | $84.07 |
| Children 4 years and under | With a paying adult | Free |
Those are the prices as printed. HST is added at checkout on all of them, and buying online adds $2.99 per ticket in processing fees. The fair states both conditions on every one of these tickets.
The family pass is worth checking against the alternative. Two adults and two children bought separately come to $97.34 before tax; the family pass covers the same group for $84.07. It applies to children aged 5 to 13.
When are the $13 nights at the CNE?
Eight specific evenings, not every evening. The fair calls the promotion “13$ Nights” — dollar sign after the number — and it runs on these dates only:
Mon 24 Aug, Tue 25 Aug, Wed 26 Aug, Thu 27 Aug, Mon 31 Aug, Tue 1 Sep, Wed 2 Sep, Thu 3 Sep
Two things make this offer easy to miss. Online it is not on sale all day: the link is switched on at 4.45pm on each of those dates. And the $13 already includes HST, which almost nothing else on the ticket page does.
That second point is what makes it a genuinely large saving rather than a modest one. A $26.55 general admission is a pre-tax figure; the $13 is the finished price.
What other CNE ticket deals are there in 2026?
Five more, and three of them cannot be bought online at all.
| Offer | Price | When | Where |
|---|---|---|---|
| 13$ Nights | $13 | 24–27 Aug, 31 Aug–3 Sep | Gate or online |
| Opening Day Deal | $15.00 | 21 Aug | Gate or online |
| Kid’s Toonie Monday | $2 | 24 Aug, 31 Aug | Gate only |
| EXcelunch Special | $30 | Mon–Wed, 11am–1pm | Gate only |
| Opening Day Ride Special | $25 | 21 Aug | Booth only |
| Kid’s Toonie Monday Ride Special | $30 | 24 Aug, 31 Aug | Booth only |
Kid’s Toonie Monday is the standout for families: $2 for anyone 13 or under, on 24 and 31 August, accompanied by a paying adult, at the gate only. The price includes HST.
The EXcelunch is the oddest and the most specific, and the table above compresses its conditions. Thirty dollars gets you in between 11am and 1pm Monday to Wednesday, Labour Day Monday excepted, from the Saskatchewan Gates, the TTC/GO Gates or the Princes’ Gates — and if you leave by 2pm you get a refund at the same gate you came in by.
What does a CNE ride pass cost?
$75.22 for the all-day pass that includes admission, or $55 for rides only. The difference matters more than it looks.
| Pass | Admission? | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Ride All Day Pass | Yes | $75.22 |
| Ride All Day Pass (Children & 65 Plus) | Yes | $70.80 |
| Ride All Day Pass only | No | $55 |
The $55 ride-only pass does not include grounds admission, and it is sold on site at the ride ticket booths rather than online. Add general admission to it and you are past the price of the $75.22 pass that bundles both, so the ride-only option really only makes sense if you already have a ticket in hand.
The children and 65-plus version of the all-day pass covers 13-and-unders and over-65s at $70.80, again including admission.
How do CNE ride coupons work?
Each ride costs between eight and twenty-two coupons, and coupons are sold in three bundles at the midway booths.
| Coupons | Price |
|---|---|
| 14 | $10 |
| 58 | $30 |
| 136 | $60 |
Doing the arithmetic is worth a minute. At the 136-coupon rate, coupons work out at about 44 cents each, so a single ride costs roughly $3.50 to $9.70 depending on which one it is. Fourteen coupons at $10 is about 71 cents each and may not even cover one of the bigger rides.
That is the calculation the all-day pass is really competing with: if a group plans on more than about a dozen rides, the pass stops being the expensive option.
Where do you buy CNE tickets?
At the CNE gates or online at theex.com — but not everything is available both ways.
| Available | Tickets |
|---|---|
| Gate or online | General, senior, child, family, both Ride All Day Passes, 13$ Nights, Opening Day Deal |
| Gate only | Kid’s Toonie Monday, EXcelunch Special |
| Ride booth only | Ride-only day pass, ride coupons, both Opening Day and Toonie Monday ride specials |
If a promotion says gate only, there is no advance purchase and no online equivalent. That includes the two cheapest offers of the whole fair.
Are there VIP or add-on tickets?
Yes, for the Bandshell concerts, starting at $40 per person. The Front Row VIP Add-On covers a reserved viewing area at the front of the stage, a VIP lounge with its own bathroom, bar access and one drink ticket.
One condition is easy to miss: gate entry is not included. The add-on has to be bought alongside an admission ticket, and neither HST nor the $2.99 fee is in the $40 figure. The fair also lists a long run of Bell SOUNDSTAGE acts for which the add-on is already sold out.
Separately, the CNE Drag Brunch EXtravaganza is $102.99 and does include admission, for 30 August. That price has the $2.99 service fee built in, with HST still added at checkout.
What is the cheapest way into the CNE?
Two dollars, if the person going is 13 or under and the day is a Monday. After that it is the $13 nights, then the $15 opening-day ticket, which has already passed.
| If you are | Cheapest option | Price |
|---|---|---|
| 13 or under | Kid’s Toonie Monday, 24 or 31 Aug, at the gate | $2 |
| Any age | 13$ Nights, eight dates from 4.45pm | $13 |
| Going midweek at lunchtime | EXcelunch, 11am–1pm Mon–Wed | $30 |
| 4 or under | Any day, with a paying adult | Free |
The honest comparison needs the tax point applied. A $13 night is tax-inclusive; the $26.55 general admission is not, and online it also picks up $2.99. Whatever the exact checkout figure, the gap between a normal day ticket and a $13 night is larger than the two headline numbers imply.
Sources
| Source | Used for |
|---|---|
| Canadian National Exhibition — tickets | Every price, eligibility rule, date restriction and purchase channel on this page, including the 13$ Nights dates and 4.45pm online activation, the HST and $2.99 conditions, the ride coupon bundles and the VIP add-on terms |
How we verified this
✅ Every price here was read from the fair’s own tickets page, not from a listings site or a news round-up. theex.com publishes each ticket as a card with its price, eligibility and conditions, and all of them are transcribed into a committed snapshot so the article and the data cannot drift apart.
⚠️ The page prints prices as bare numbers with no currency code, and the currency is established by context rather than by a label. These are Canadian dollars: the fair is at Exhibition Place in Toronto, the page adds HST at checkout, and one of the promotions is named after the Canadian two-dollar coin. That inference is stated here rather than left implicit.
🔴 The advertised prices are not what most people pay, and the exceptions matter more than the rule. The tickets page adds HST at checkout on general admission, the senior and child tickets, the family pass and both Ride All Day Passes, and adds $2.99 per ticket on online purchases. But it explicitly states that the 13$ Nights, Kid’s Toonie Monday and EXcelunch prices already include HST. Anyone comparing the $13 night against the $26.55 day ticket is comparing a tax-inclusive price with a tax-exclusive one, and the real gap is wider than the numbers suggest.
⚠️ The fair spells it “13$ Nights”, with the dollar sign after the number. The conventional form is used in this article’s headings so that it matches what people search for, and the official spelling is noted once so nobody thinks they have found a different promotion.
🔴 Several of the best offers cannot be bought in advance. Kid’s Toonie Monday, the EXcelunch and the ride-only day pass are gate or booth purchases. Planning to buy them online is the single most likely way to be caught out, so the where-to-buy column is on every offer rather than in a footnote.
⚠️ No purchase was made and no checkout total was tested, so the final amount after tax and fees is not quoted for any ticket. Prices were read on the date stamped in the data file and the fair can change them. This site carries no affiliate links.