Canada extended its general copyright term from life plus 50 years to life plus 70 years on 2022-12-30 (30 December 2022).
The extension did not pull works back out of the public domain. Under the ordinary life-based rule, works by authors who died in 1971 had completed the former term by 2022-01-01 (1 January 2022). They remained public domain. Works by authors who died in 1972 had not completed that former term when the extension took effect, so the longer term applies.
That boundary is why a calculator must encode transition dates rather than replacing every old rule with the current headline term.
Posthumous works, Crown material, sound recordings and treaty questions can follow additional rules. The general boundary is a starting point, not a substitute for reviewing the exact work.
Reviewed 2026-09-11. This guide is a research aid, not legal advice.