Air Quality in Edmonton, Alberta — Live

Live readings from PurpleAir sensors across Edmonton — with free alerts the moment the air turns.

Live Edmonton AQI from nearby PurpleAir sensors loads when this page opens in a browser, along with a live sensor map covering Edmonton and St. Albert, Sherwood Park, Fort Saskatchewan, Spruce Grove.

Environment and Climate Change Canada has counted smoke hours in Edmonton since 1953, logging an hour whenever visibility drops to six statute miles or less. In 2023 the city recorded 299 of them, beating the previous record of 229 set in 2018 by about 70 hours, nearly three full days. The year before that, 2022, Edmonton had none at all. On 17 September 2023 the Air Quality Health Index here reached 10+, the very high risk band at the top of the scale, then fell back to a 3 by the following afternoon. Alberta had 2.03 million hectares burned by 18 September that year, with the season still officially running into October.

Canairy watches the sensors around your home, your kids' school, and everywhere else you care about, and tells you in plain English when the air changes enough to matter.

2023 put more smoke over the city than any year on the record

Natalie Hasell, a warning preparedness meteorologist with Environment and Climate Change Canada, put the season in context while it was still going: this is the greatest number of smoke hours we have ever seen in Edmonton since these measurements have been made. The jump was not gradual. Edmonton logged 126 smoke hours in 2021, zero in 2022, then 299 in 2023, which is the kind of swing that makes a seasonal average useless for planning anything.

It started early. On 20 May 2023, Fort Edmonton Park stayed shut rather than open to the public because of wildfire smoke, and the risk stayed at very high for days. Provincially, Alberta counts a day as smoke-impacted when the daily average PM2.5 goes above 15 micrograms per cubic metre; in 2023 some northern Alberta stations passed 100 such days in the year, while southern stations saw around 26. Edmonton sits between those two extremes, which in practice means the season here is unpredictable rather than mild.

The refining complex northeast of town has its own airshed

Alberta's Industrial Heartland covers about 582 square kilometres north and east of Edmonton and is Canada's largest hydrocarbon processing region, with more than 40 companies and over 45 billion dollars of capital already in the ground. Shell's Scotford site alone combines an upgrader, an oil refinery and a chemicals plant. The stretch has been nicknamed Upgrader Alley, and Refinery Row sits closer still, in Strathcona County on the city's eastern edge.

That industry is monitored, and monitored separately. The Heartland Air Monitoring Partnership, formed in 1997 and an official airshed since 2000, watches a 4,500 square kilometre area immediately north and east of Edmonton and reports the AQHI from stations across it. The Strathcona Industrial Association runs its own continuous monitoring 365 days a year for hydrogen sulphide, sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides. The City of Edmonton, for its part, says the majority of air quality concerns in Edmonton come from refining or burning carbon-based energy sources, coal, oil, natural gas, diesel, gasoline and even wood. Whether any of that reaches your particular street on a given day is a wind question, not a plant question, and a sensor near your house answers it better than a plant fenceline does.

Four city monitors, and what four monitors cannot tell you

Edmonton has four continuous ambient air quality monitoring stations, jointly managed by Alberta Environment and Parks and the Alberta Capital Airshed. The city takes the results seriously enough to put AQHI lights on display at City Hall, Edmonton Tower and the O-day'min Primary Care Network, and Edmonton Public Libraries lend out AirBeam kits so residents can measure fine particulate matter themselves. There is also an idling bylaw, Bylaw 15982, which prohibits vehicle idling in designated areas outside schools and hospitals, and a municipal Ozone Management Plan.

Four stations for a city this size gives you an honest regional picture and not much more. Edmonton spreads across the North Saskatchewan River valley and its ravine system, from Windermere in the southwest to Clareview in the northeast, and the air is not the same everywhere at once. Reading the sensors closest to the places you actually spend time is the difference between knowing the region is smoky and knowing whether to keep your windows open tonight.

Edmonton air quality FAQ

Why is there smoke in Edmonton today?

Between May and September the usual answer is wildfire smoke, from fires in northern Alberta or drifting in from British Columbia or Saskatchewan. The City of Edmonton lists forest fire smoke from all three as a regular source. The volume varies wildly from year to year: the city logged zero smoke hours in 2022 and a record 299 in 2023. Outside fire season, a haze that does not smell like a campfire is more likely traffic and combustion, which the city names as its other main contributors. The live reading below will show you what is actually in the air rather than what the season suggests.

What is the air quality in Edmonton right now?

This page shows the current AQI for Edmonton, calculated from PurpleAir sensors across the city and updated continuously. The province and the Alberta Capital Airshed run four continuous stations here, which is enough for a regional picture but not for a neighbourhood one. The map below shows every live sensor, so you can check the one nearest your own address instead of a citywide average.

Canada reports the AQHI, so why does this page show a different number?

Environment and Climate Change Canada publishes the Air Quality Health Index, a 1 to 10+ scale built from three pollutants measured together: fine particulate matter, ground-level ozone and nitrogen dioxide. PurpleAir sensors measure fine particulate matter only, so an AQHI cannot honestly be calculated from them. This page shows the US EPA AQI instead, which is derived from PM2.5 directly and is what most air quality apps use. It is not an AQHI and Canairy does not present it as one. For the official AQHI for Edmonton, Environment Canada and Alberta's air quality map are the sources.

Does the Industrial Heartland affect air quality in Edmonton itself?

The Industrial Heartland is a genuine industrial concentration, about 582 square kilometres of refineries, upgraders and chemical plants north and east of the city, and it is watched closely enough to have its own dedicated monitoring body. The Heartland Air Monitoring Partnership has covered a 4,500 square kilometre area immediately north and east of Edmonton since 1997, and the Strathcona Industrial Association monitors hydrogen sulphide, sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides continuously. What that monitoring is designed to characterise is the airshed around the plants, not your block in Edmonton. If you live on the east or north side and want to know what the air is doing at your house on a given wind, a nearby sensor is the direct answer.

What AQI level is unhealthy?

Under the US EPA scale, AQI 0–50 is Good and 51–100 is Moderate. From 101 the air is Unhealthy for Sensitive Groups — kids, older adults, and people with asthma or heart conditions — and above 150 it's Unhealthy for everyone. Canairy translates these numbers into a plain-English verdict, like whether to close the windows or move a workout indoors.

Is Canairy free?

Yes. The Canairy app is free to download and includes live air quality for all your saved places, plain-English verdicts, and free push alerts when the air crosses your threshold. A paid plan adds extras like SMS text alerts.

Get Canairy free on Google Play.