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.

Fireworks over the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto — CNE fireworks — Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0

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.

Sources

Continue reading

Toronto's Harbourfront and waterfront seen from above

Toronto's Waterfront

A former industrial shipping and rail strip along Lake Ontario, being rebuilt piece by piece into parks,…

The Princes' Gates

Built in 1927 for Canada's diamond jubilee of Confederation and opened by two visiting British princes, the…

G. Ross Lord Park

Built around a dam constructed after Hurricane Hazel to control flooding on the West Don River, G. Ross Lord…

Toronto's Comedy Scene

A Chicago import that put down roots in an old firehouse in 1973 turned into one of the most influential…

Browse all Toronto Guide topics → Browse the slang dictionary → Read the history of Toronto slang →