Best Halal Tech ETFs in Canada 2026: 4 Shariah-Compliant Picks Ranked by Tech Weight + Fee

Why Every Halal Fund Is Already a Tech Fund (and Why a Pure One Exists)

Here is the part most people searching "halal tech ETF" have backwards: technology is not a hard sector to invest in halal — it is the easiest. The AAOIFI screen kills conventional banks and insurers because their revenue is interest (riba), and it kills heavily leveraged sectors because interest-bearing debt above 30% of market capitalization fails the ratio test. Tech companies are the opposite profile: they sell software, hardware, and semiconductors, and the giants carry debt loads far below the threshold. That is why Apple, Microsoft, and Nvidia sit at the top of nearly every Shariah-screened fund on the market.

The consequence shows up in the sector weights. SPUS — the Shariah-screened version of the S&P 500 — runs roughly 40% information technology because the screen removed the banks and redistributed their weight. HLAL runs roughly 51%. Compare that to a broad unscreened fund like XEQT, which fails the screen outright on its bank and insurer holdings — we ran the full breakdown in our XEQT Shariah verdict. So if you want tech-heavy halal exposure, you have two routes: a diversified screened fund that is structurally tech-tilted anyway, or the one fund built as a pure technology play. Both routes are ranked below, and the full landscape of screened funds lives in our halal ETF guide for Canada.

The 2026 Ranking: 4 Halal Tech ETFs Compared

Ranked by technology exposure first, then fee. All figures pulled from issuer pages and fund data in June 2026 — holdings and sector weights shift quarterly, so treat the weights as a snapshot, not a constant.

1. SPTE — the only pure-play halal tech ETF

SPTE is the SP Funds S&P Global Technology ETF, launched in November 2023, and it is the only fund on the market that gives you 100% technology exposure with the Shariah screen applied inside the fund. It tracks the S&P Global 1200 Shariah Information Technology Index — 102 holdings as of mid-2026 — and because the index is global rather than US-only, the top of the fund looks different from a Nasdaq tracker: Taiwan Semiconductor and Apple each at roughly 11.3%, Nvidia at 10.9%, Microsoft at 7.7%, and the Dutch chip-equipment maker ASML at 6.4%. You get the global semiconductor supply chain, not just the US names.

The expense ratio is 0.55% — the highest on this list, and the price of being the only fund in its category. It is also a young, small fund, which means wider bid-ask spreads than a mega-ETF and the standard small-fund caveat that issuers can shutter products that do not gather assets. SP Funds has scale elsewhere (SPUS holds over $2 billion), which makes a closure unlikely but not impossible. If you want concentrated, screened, global tech in a single ticker, this is the pick — there is no second option.

2. HLAL — half the fund is tech, with US large-cap ballast

HLAL is the Wahed FTSE USA Shariah ETF: roughly 208 US holdings tracking the FTSE USA Shariah Index, with technology at roughly 51% of the fund and a 0.50% expense ratio. Think of it as the halal answer to a growth-tilted US equity fund — the screen stripped out the banks, insurers, and high-debt names, and what remains is dominated by the same mega-cap tech that drives the S&P 500, plus healthcare and industrials filling the gap. Wahed is the larger Islamic-finance platform behind it; if you are weighing the robo route instead of self-directed, our Manzil vs Wahed comparison covers how the platforms stack up for Canadians.

HLAL is the ranking's best answer for an investor who wants tech to dominate the portfolio without betting on a single sector. At 51% technology you participate fully in a tech rally, but the other half of the fund cushions a sector-specific drawdown in a way SPTE structurally cannot.

3. SPUS — the cheapest screen, 40% tech by construction

SPUS applies the Shariah industry-exclusion screen to the S&P 500 and charges 0.45% — the lowest fee of any screened fund on this list. The result is roughly 40% information technology, with Nvidia (13.8%), Apple (11.6%), and Microsoft (8.2%) as the top three holdings, and over $2 billion in assets making it the most liquid halal ETF available. The plain S&P 500 fails the screen because of its bank and insurer weight — the full reasoning is in our S&P 500 Shariah verdict — and SPUS is precisely that index with the failing names removed.

SPUS is the default core holding for a self-directed halal portfolio: cheapest, biggest, most liquid, and already more tech-heavy than the unscreened S&P 500. If you came to this article wanting "more tech in my halal portfolio," check whether SPUS alone already gives you enough — 40% is a serious tech allocation by any conventional standard.

4. WSHR — the only CAD-listed option, but light on tech

WSHR — the Wealthsimple Shariah World Equity Index ETF — is the only Shariah-screened ETF that trades in Canadian dollars, on Cboe Canada, with a 0.50% management fee and roughly $470 million in assets. It ranks last here for one reason: its index is a Dow Jones Islamic Market index with a quality and low-volatility tilt, which steers the fund away from expensive growth names. Information technology is just 12.4% of the fund, behind consumer staples (15.5%), healthcare (13.9%), and industrials (13.4%).

That makes WSHR the wrong vehicle for tech exposure — and a genuinely useful diversifier beside the US-listed funds, because it zigs where they zag. It is also the fund inside Wealthsimple's managed halal portfolios, which run roughly 0.9-1.0% all-in once the management fee stacks on top — our Wealthsimple halal review breaks down when the managed route is worth that premium. Buy WSHR for CAD convenience and low-volatility ballast; buy SPTE, HLAL, or SPUS for the tech.

Why Not Just Buy QQQ, QQQM, or XQQ?

The obvious question, since the Nasdaq-100 is the tech index everyone knows. It even starts from a better place than most: the Nasdaq-100 excludes financial companies by index design, so there are no conventional banks or insurers inside — it clears the AAOIFI Stage 1 business-activity screen that sinks XEQT and the S&P 500 immediately.

But clearing one stage is not compliance. AAOIFI Standard 21 also applies three financial-ratio tests — interest-bearing debt no more than 30% of market capitalization, cash plus interest-bearing securities no more than 30%, impermissible income no more than 5% of total income — and the Nasdaq-100 includes individual companies that breach them. The index selects for size and liquidity, not compliance, and non-compliant names rotate in and out with no mechanism to remove them. A fund that might pass this quarter and fail the next is not a holding you can rely on — the same structural problem that sinks unscreened index funds generally.

The fee math softens the blow of switching. QQQM charges 0.15%, so a move to SPTE costs an extra $400 per year on $100K. But the Canadian-listed XQQ charges a 0.39% MER — against SPTE's 0.55%, the gap is $160 per year on $100K. If XQQ was your plan, genuinely screened global tech costs you about $13 a month more.

How to Actually Buy These from Canada

Three of the four ranked funds — SPTE, HLAL, SPUS — are US-listed, which means buying them involves US dollars. Any Canadian brokerage with US market access works: Questrade, Wealthsimple, Interactive Brokers, or a big-bank discount broker. The cost to watch is currency conversion — brokerages charge a spread when converting CAD to USD, and on a large purchase that spread can exceed a year of MER difference. In accounts that support it, Norbert's gambit (buying an interlisted security in CAD and journaling it to the US side) cuts the conversion cost to nearly the commission alone. WSHR is the exception: it trades in CAD on Cboe Canada, no conversion required, which is part of its appeal despite the low tech weight.

TFSA or RRSP: Where the US Listing Actually Costs You

Under the Canada-US tax treaty, dividends from US-listed ETFs paid into an RRSP are exempt from US withholding tax — the treaty recognizes the RRSP as a retirement account. A TFSA gets no such recognition, so the same dividends are docked the 15% treaty withholding rate before they reach you, and that tax is unrecoverable inside the TFSA.

For tech funds, keep this in perspective: technology companies pay modest dividends, so the absolute dollars withheld on SPTE or HLAL are small — this should not stop you from using TFSA room if that is what you have. The 2026 numbers to plan around: $7,000 of new TFSA room ($109,000 cumulative if eligible since 2009) and an RRSP dollar maximum of $33,810, or 18% of prior-year earned income if lower. The clean structure is US-listed halal funds in the RRSP first, WSHR or remaining positions in the TFSA. Our halal TFSA guide walks through compliant account construction in full.

One more switching note: if you currently hold QQQM or XQQ inside an RRSP or TFSA, selling and rebuying a screened fund triggers no tax — registered accounts have no capital gains events. In a non-registered account, the sale realizes gains at the 50% inclusion rate, so an Ontario investor at the 53.53% top combined marginal rate pays roughly 26.8 cents per dollar of accrued gain as the one-time cost of getting compliant.

The Honest Trade-Offs Before You Buy

A ranked list owes you the downsides, not just the picks:

• Concentration is the real risk, not the fee. SPTE holds roughly 65% of the fund in its top ten names. A pure tech fund participates fully in every sector drawdown — the Nasdaq-100 lost roughly a third of its value in 2022, and a screened tech fund would have tracked a similar fall. Size the position like the concentrated bet it is.
• You are already tech-heavy without trying. A portfolio of SPUS alone carries ~40% technology. Adding SPTE on top can quietly push total tech exposure past 50-60% — check the look-through before you buy, not after.
• The compliance premium is real. $160-$400 per year on $100K versus the unscreened Nasdaq trackers. That is the cost of the screen, the Shariah board, and the smaller asset base. Name it, accept it, or do not buy it — but do not pretend it is not there.
• Purification still applies. The AAOIFI screen tolerates up to 5% incidental impermissible income, and that fraction of your return should be donated to charity. The issuers and screening platforms publish purification figures — small amounts for tech funds, but not zero.
• Holdings drift. Sector weights and compliance status move quarterly. The figures in this article are a June 2026 snapshot — verify current data through Musaffa or Zoya before placing a large order.

The Bottom Line: One Pure Play, Two Strong Cores, One CAD Diversifier

If the question is "what is the halal QQQ?" — the closest honest answer is SPTE at 0.55%, the only purpose-built Shariah tech fund, with a global tilt the Nasdaq-100 does not have. If the question is really "how do I get serious tech exposure in a halal portfolio?" — the better answer for most investors is SPUS or HLAL as the core (40% and 51% tech respectively, at lower fees and with diversification built in) with SPTE as a 10-25% satellite only if you hold a deliberate conviction in the sector. WSHR earns its place as the CAD-listed, low-volatility counterweight, not as a tech holding.

For how these tech-focused picks fit into the broader screened universe — including the dividend and fixed-income-alternative sleeves a complete portfolio needs — start with our full ranking of the best halal ETFs in Canada for 2026.