GIS Payment Dates 2026: All 12 Deposit Days, the $1,109.85 Maximum + the July 29 Reset

Your next GIS payment arrives Friday, June 26, 2026, in the same deposit as your OAS pension. For a single senior receiving the maximum, that deposit is $1,852.90 — $1,109.85 of GIS stacked on $743.05 of OAS at the April-to-June quarterly rates. The payment after that, July 29, is the one to circle: it opens the new benefit year, and it is the first payment calculated from your 2025 tax return.

Below is the full 2026 calendar straight from the Service Canada schedule, the amount that lands on each date by marital status, how the GIS dates line up against CPP, CCB, and the GST/HST credit, and the two date-driven traps — the July reassessment and the five-week December-to-January gap — that catch seniors every year.

The Full 2026 GIS Payment Calendar

GIS is paid monthly, on the same date as OAS, because Service Canada combines the two into a single deposit. These are the 12 official dates for 2026, published on the Government of Canada benefits payment calendar:

Every date is a banking day — Service Canada fixes the calendar in advance precisely so no payment ever needs to shift for a weekend or statutory holiday. Direct deposits land on the date shown; mailed cheques leave on the same schedule but take several extra days in transit, which is why a "late" payment is almost always a cheque problem, not a schedule problem.

Why July 29 Is the Payment to Watch

Most GIS recipients treat all 12 dates as interchangeable. They are not. The GIS benefit year runs July to June, and every July the entire year of payments is recalculated from the income on your prior-year tax return. The July 29, 2026 deposit is therefore the first one based on your 2025 income — and if 2025 included a one-time spike, this is the payment where the damage shows up.

The taper is steep: GIS falls by roughly $1 for every $2 of income other than OAS, and it hits zero at $22,512 of annual income for a single senior. A $10,000 RRIF withdrawal taken in 2025 cuts roughly $5,000 of GIS from the July 2026 to June 2027 benefit year — the full mechanics of the income test, including the cutoffs for every marital status, are in our breakdown of the 2026 GIS eligibility and income thresholds.

July is also one of the four quarterly indexation points. GIS and OAS rates are reviewed against the cost of living every January, April, July, and October, and by law the amounts never decrease even if prices fall. So the July 29 payment can move for two reasons at once: your recalculated income test, and the new quarterly rate. If your deposit changes that day, the income reassessment is almost always the bigger of the two effects.

How Much Lands on Each Date (April to June 2026 Quarter)

The dates tell you when; your marital status and income decide how much. These are the current maximums from the Government of Canada OAS payment amounts table, in effect for the April to June 2026 quarter:

Remember the deposit you see combines GIS with OAS. The maximum OAS pension for this quarter is $743.05/month for ages 65 to 74 and $817.36 for 75 and over, so a single senior aged 65 to 74 with no other income receives $1,852.90 per month — about $22,235 a year, with the $13,318 GIS portion entirely tax-free. How the top-up shrinks as income rises, dollar by dollar, is covered in our guide to GIS payment amounts for 2026, and the OAS side of the deposit — including the 75+ top-up and the clawback that starts at $95,323 — is in the 2026 OAS payment amounts breakdown.

One Calendar, Three Schedules: GIS vs CPP vs CCB vs GST/HST

A common point of confusion in households juggling multiple benefits: not everything federal arrives on the GIS date. Three distinct schedules run through 2026:

So a 67-year-old receiving CPP, OAS, and GIS sees two deposits on each of the 12 dates — CPP in one, OAS-plus-GIS in the other. The amounts on the CPP side run on their own scale: the 2026 maximum at 65 is $1,507.65/month, while new beneficiaries in January 2026 averaged $925.35 — the full picture is in our 2026 CPP payment amounts guide. Grandparents raising grandchildren should note the CCB follows its own mid-month calendar, and lower-income seniors usually also qualify for the quarterly GST/HST credit, which landed January 5 and April 2 and arrives next on July 3 — renamed the Canada Groceries and Essentials Benefit starting with that July payment, with a 25% boost to the amount.

The December 22 Payment and the Five-Week January Gap

The December payment is the one structural quirk in the calendar. Service Canada pays early — December 22 in 2026 — so the money arrives before the holidays. Helpful, except for what follows: the next payment does not land until the last week of January. From December 22, that is a stretch of roughly five weeks, against the usual four.

For a senior living close to the line on $1,852.90 a month, that extra week is real. The practical move is boring and effective: treat the December deposit as 36 days of budget, not 30. The seniors who get caught are the ones who absorb the early payment into December spending and hit the third week of January with nothing left. Service Canada has not yet published the 2027 calendar, but the January payment has landed in the final week of January every year — plan on the gap.

Three Date-Driven Moves That Protect Your GIS

1. File your 2025 return well before the July reassessment

GIS does not renew on an application — it renews on your tax return. Service Canada recalculates every recipient at the July reset using the prior-year return, and if yours is not filed and assessed, payments can stop entirely until it is. Filing by the April 30 deadline gives CRA and Service Canada time to process before the July 29 payment. For a senior with little taxable income, filing feels pointless; it is actually the single act that keeps $13,318 a year of tax-free GIS flowing.

2. Time large withdrawals against the benefit-year calendar

Because the July reset looks at the prior calendar year, income you take in 2026 hits your GIS from July 2027 through June 2028. That lag is a planning tool. If a large RRIF withdrawal is unavoidable, taking it in a year when your GIS is already reduced — rather than spreading spikes across two years and damaging two benefit years — contains the loss. Mandatory minimums leave less room to maneuver: the prescribed percentage rises with age on a fixed CRA schedule, which you can check against the full 2026 RRIF minimum withdrawal table. TFSA withdrawals, by contrast, never touch the GIS income test in any year.

3. Switch to direct deposit if you still receive cheques

Every "missing" GIS payment we see in practice is one of two things: a cheque in the mail, or an unfiled return. Direct deposit through your My Service Canada Account eliminates the first cause completely — the money lands on the published date, every month, including the early December payment. If a direct deposit is genuinely absent on the scheduled day, contact Service Canada rather than waiting; a stopped payment usually signals a file problem that will not fix itself.

The Bottom Line: The Calendar Is Fixed — Your Amount Is Not

The 12 dates above will not move. What moves is the number that lands on them: the quarterly indexation in January, April, July, and October nudges it up, and the July 29 income reassessment can cut it — or erase it — based on what you did in 2025. The recipients who keep the most GIS are the ones who manage the calendar deliberately: return filed by April 30, big withdrawals timed against the benefit year, spending money drawn from the TFSA, and the December deposit stretched across five weeks. The dates are Service Canada's job. The amount is yours.