1.4 million visitors, 18 days a year
The CNE ("The Ex")
Toronto's end-of-summer ritual: an agricultural fair turned mega-event, running every year for 18 days leading up to Labour Day since 1879.
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Locals just call it the Ex. Officially the Canadian National Exhibition, it's Toronto's single biggest recurring annual event, and one most Torontonians have a strong, specific opinion about (usually the food).
From agricultural fair to mega-event (1879–present)
The CNE traces back to a travelling agricultural fair that circulated among towns in what's now southern Ontario through the 1840s. The City of Toronto leased lakefront land as a permanent fairground in 1878 and held its first exhibition on the site the following year, drawing roughly 100,000 visitors at 25 cents admission. Newspapers began calling it the "Canadian National Exhibition" by 1904, and the name stuck.
What it is today
The modern CNE runs for 18 days leading up to and including Labour Day each September, drawing more than 1.4 million visitors annually to Exhibition Place on the western waterfront — making it one of the largest annual fairs in North America. Expect a midway with rides, agricultural and livestock displays that echo its original purpose, an air show over the lake, and a genuinely enormous, genuinely unhinged food lineup that's become a bigger draw than the rides for a lot of attendees.
Exhibition Place: more than one event
The CNE's permanent home, Exhibition Place, hosts events year-round beyond the fair itself, including concerts and the Coca-Cola Coliseum. It's also, not coincidentally, close to the same waterfront corridor covered in our waterfront guide.
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Sources
- Wikipedia — Canadian National Exhibition
- The Canadian Encyclopedia — Canadian National Exhibition
- The Ex — Our Organization