105 Trusty Facts about Toronto

Toronto is Canada’s largest city. In many ways, it is the country’s financial, industrial, communications, media capital, and cultural capital.

Below you’ll learn about T.O. with these fascinating and recently researched facts about Toronto! Find out more with these interesting facts about Ontario, the province where Toronto is found.

General Toronto Facts

• Toronto is the largest city in Canada and 4^th largest city in North America after Mexico City, New York City, and Los Angeles.

• It is the capital city of Ontario province (but not the capital of Canada, which is a common mistake. That would be Ottawa).

• Toronto is located in southeastern Ontario, on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario, one of the five Great Lakes.

• Toronto is only 65 km (40 mi) from Niagara Falls and 540 km (335 mi) from New York City, as the crow flies.

• Toronto sits further south than points in 15 US states.

• Toronto is at a similar latitude as Florence, Italy, and is antipodal to Augusta, Western Australia.

• With a population of 2.8 million (metro 6.2 million), Toronto is by far the largest city in Canada. It is similar in size to Montreal and Vancouver (the 2^nd and 3^rd largest) combined.

• The Greater Toronto Area includes 25 municipalities, including Durham, Halton, Peel, and York. Combined with Hamilton, it is called the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA), and combined with the Niagara region it is called the Golden Horseshoe, wrapping around the western end of Lake Ontario.

• In total, the Golden Horseshoe population centre is home to 9.8 million people, or a quarter of Canada’s total population, in only 0.5% of the country’s total area.

• Toronto is one of the most ethnically diverse cities in the world. Over half the city’s residents are visible minorities, and nearly half were born outside of Canada.

• 95% of city’s residents speak English. 1.6% are native French speakers, while 9.1% are bilingual in English and French.

• The 911 emergency line in Toronto is capable of responding in over 150 languages.

• The Toronto area was the traditional homeland of the Mississaugas of the Credit, Anishnabeg, Chippewa, Haudenosaunee, and Wendat peoples.

• The name Toronto likely derives from the Mohawk word tkaronto, which means “where there are trees standing in the water”, and referred to the narrows between Lake Simcoe and Lake Couchiching north of Toronto.

• The English and French used several variations of the word, like Tarento, Tarontha, Taronto, Toranto, Torento, and Toronton.

• People from Toronto are called Torontonians or simply “residents of Toronto”.

• Some early nicknames for Toronto were Little York and Muddy York, comparing it to New York City.

• Today there is a long list of nicknames for Toronto. Here are just a few: T.O., Queen City, Hogtown, Centre of the Universe, The Megacity, The City that Works, The Big Smoke, the 416 (after its most common telephone code) or simply “The 6” (popularized by Drake).   

• The city’s official motto is Diversity Our Strength. For a short time, the city tried to adopt the new slogan “Toronto Unlimited” in 2005, but so far no other has been officially proposed.

• The city name is abbreviated as TOR or Trt, while YYZ is the city’s airport code.

• The flag of Toronto shows a white outline of the twin towers of Toronto City Hall, which form a T for Toronto, on a blue background, with a red maple leaf at the bottom. The city’s coat of arms, which features a beaver and bear, can be seen here.

• Toronto has 10 sister/partner cities: Chicago (Illinois), Chongqing (China), Frankfurt (Germany), Milan (Italy), Hi Chi Minh City (Vietnam), Kyiv (Ukraine), Quito (Ecuador), Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), Sagamihara (Japan), and Warsaw (Poland).

Random Interesting Facts about Toronto

• Torontonians, along with residents of Montreal and a few cities in British Columbia, are the thinnest in Canada on average.

• Toronto has been ranked as the safest major city in North America and 6^th safest in the world.

• Toronto has 140 neighbourhoods, many of which used to be their own municipalities. Today, many of them have totally distinct characters, so Toronto has been called the “City of Neighbourhoods.”

• The city even has a neighbourhood called “The Beaches”, after the fact that it has 4 beaches on Lake Ontario.

• The 15 Toronto Islands on Lake Ontario provide shelter to downtown Toronto, not to mention they are North America’s largest car-free urban community. They are also home to the Billy Bishop Toronto City Airport, Centreville Amusement Park, and other attractions.

• Toronto has Canada’s only national urban park, called Rouge National Urban Park. It protects a region of the Rouge River and its various tributaries in Toronto.

• There are 4 national parks within 3-4 hours of Toronto: Thousand Islands, Georgian Bay Islands, Bruce Peninsula, and Point Pelee National Parks. The latter is the southernmost point of mainland Canada.

• CN Tower in Toronto has been the tallest structure in Canada and the entire Western Hemisphere since it was built in 1976. It stands 553 m (1815 ft) tall.

• 17 of Canada’s 20 tallest buildings are all located in Toronto. The number 1 spot goes to Sky Tower, at 312.5 m / 1025 ft, which will be completed in 2024.

• The Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto is Canada’s largest museum and most visited museum, with over 1.4 million visitors annually.

• The Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto is the largest and most visited art gallery in Canada. It includes several paintings by the Group of Seven, a famous group of Ontario artists.

• The Gardiner Museum in Toronto is Canada’s only museum dedicated entirely to ceramic arts. The city also has a whole museum for shoes, the Bata Shoe Museum, and another for Islamic arts, the Aga Khan Museum.

• The Toronto public library system is the largest in Canada, with over 100 branches and 12 million books and other items in its collection.

• Spanning 287 hectares (710 acres), the Toronto Zoo is the largest zoo in Canada. It houses over 5000 animals belonging to 460+ species.

• With 50 million guests per year, Toronto Eaton Centre is the most visited mall in Canada, and 2^nd in North America after Ala Moana Center in Honolulu, Hawaii. It is surpasses in size, however, by West Edmonton Mall in Edmonton, Alberta.

• Toronto also has the world’s largest underground shopping complex, called PATH. It connects more than 70 buildings with 30 km (19 mi) of walkways and boasts 371,600 m² (4,000,000 ft²) of retail space.

• Toronto’s Younge Street, nicknamed “Main Street Ontario” once incorrectly held the Guinness World Record for world’s longest street (a highway was included that isn’t part of the street). The street has famous attractions such as Eaton Centre, Yonge-Dundas Square, and the Toronto Hockey Hall of Fame along it.

• Toronto also has Canada’s Walk of Fame, similar to the Hollywood Walk of Fame in Los Angeles, but with maples leaves. it features the likes of Bryan Adams, Pamela Anderson, Kurt Browning, Bret hart, and Anne Murray. There are currently around 173 places.

• Toronto’s Graffiti Alley features several blocks of some of the city’s best (and legal) street art. It runs parallel to Queen Street West.

• The 3D Toronto Sign is capable of producing 228 million colour combinations with its LED lights, the same number visible by the human high. It is 3 x 22 m (9.8 x 72 ft) and cost the city $760,000.

• The record highest temperature in Toronto was 41°C (105°F) on July 10, 1936, while the lowest was -33°C (-27°F) on January 10, 1859.

• 12.7% of Toronto’s land is covered with parks, with 2.8 ha (6.9 acres) of parkland per 1000 people. (Fun fact: Ottawa has more parkland than any other city in Canada, with 8 ha per 100 people). A recent survey found that Toronto has 11.5 million trees.

• There are 37 National Historic Sites in Toronto. Some of the most famous include Union Station, Fort York, Gooderham and Worts Distillery (Distillery Historic District), Kensington Market, and University College at the University of Toronto.

• Casa Loma in midtown Toronto has been described as “the only castle in North America”, although there are definitely some others in the US (it could be argued that most of them are not technically castles, though).

• Toronto city proper receives just under 5 million foreign tourist per year (pre-COVID number), making it the most visited city in Canada. Including domestic tourists, the Greater Toronto Area received 44 million visitors in the same year.

• The Toronto Pearson International Airport is the busiest airport in Canada, with around 50 million passengers per year. It is named after Lester B. Pearson, who was born in the city.

• The University of Toronto is ranked #1 in Canada and #25 in the world.

• Former prime ministers Arthur Meighen, William Lyon Mackenzie King, Lester B. Pearson, and Paul Martin have degrees from University of Toronto.

• Insulin research, stem cell research, the electron microscope, and the artificial cardiac pacemaker were born at the University of Toronto. It was also the site of the world’s first lung transplant and nerve transplant.

• The first black hole, Cygnus X-1, was identified at the University of Toronto.

• Major companies based in the Greater Toronto Area include Bell Media, Rogers Communication, Interac, Magna International, Celestica, Royal LePage, Manulife, Sun Life Financial, Hudson’s Bay Company, Canadian Tire, Bluenotes, Cineplex Odion, Four Seasons Hotels, Indigo Books, Mac’s Convenience Store, and former companies Sears and Eaton’s, just to name a few.

• The Toronto Stock Exchange (TSX) is the 3^rd largest in North America after the New York Stock Exchange and Nasdaq.

• Bay Street is Toronto’s equivalent to Wall Street in New York City.

• Toronto is a major tech centre, with more tech jobs that the San Francisco Bay Area. The area between Toronto, Kitchener/Waterloo, and Hamilton is sometimes called the “Digital Corridor”, similar to Silicon Valley in California.

• Toronto is Canada’s most expensive city and encompasses some of the country’s most expensive neighbourhoods. The average cost of a house in Toronto today is $1.3 million, beating out the former most expensive city, Vancouver.

• The 5 largest banks in Canada (nicknamed the “Big Five” are headquartered in Toronto. They are (starting with the largest): Royal Bank of Canada, Toronto-Dominion, Bank of Nova Scotia, Bank of Montreal, and CIBC.  

• Fairmont Hotels and Resorts, which operates seven of Canada’s most iconic hotels (in Banff, Edmonton, Ottawa, Victoria, Quebec, Toronto, and Montreal) and several abroad, is also based on Toronto. The Toronto one is called Fairmont Royal York.

• Restaurants that started or are now headquartered in Toronto include Tim Hortons, Jimmy the Greek, Mr. Sub, Swiss Chalet, and St. Louis Bar & Grill.

• Some of the top annual festivals in Toronto include Toronto Caribbean Carnival (formerly Caribana), Luminato, Pride Toronto, and Toronto Summer Music Festival.

• The Toronto International Film Festival is one of the most popular film festivals in the word, with upwards of half a million attendees.

• Toronto has been dubbed “Hollywood North” because so many movies are filmed there. Vancouver, which makes slightly more than Toronto, has the same nickname.

• Movies that were filmed partially or fully in Toronto include American Psycho I and II, Billy Madison, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Pompeii, Capote, Cruel Intentions, Dracula 2000, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, RoboCop, Tommy Boy, True Lies, X-Men, and the Queer as Folk TV series, just to name a few.

• Musicians and bands from Toronto include Neil Young, Drake, Jully Black, Deborah Cox, Blue Rodeo, Snow, Peaches, Broken Social Scene, Rush, Death from Above, Metric, the Weeknd, and Our Lady Peace.

• Other famous people born in the Greater Toronto Area include actresses Mary Pickford and Catherine O’Hara, actors Jon Candy, Jim Carrey, Will Arnett, Rick Moranis, and Mike Meyers, and former Prime Ministers Lester B. Pearson and Stephen Harper.

• Most of Canada’s major media outlets and entertainment programs are based in Toronto, including CBC, CTV, and Entertainment Tonight Canada.

• Much (formerly MuchMusic), Canada’s version of MTV, is based in Toronto, and several of its past VJs has achieved national fame. Today it airs shows rather than music.

• Toronto is also a major centre of performing arts, with the National Ballet of Canada, Canadian Opera Company, and others based there.

• Yuk Yuk’s Comedy Club, now found across Canada, started in the basement of a community centre in Toronto in 1978.

• Toronto has a dozen professional sports teams. These include five major league teams: the Toronto Maple Leafs (NHL), Toronto Blue Jays (MLB), Toronto Argonauts (CFL), Toronto FC (MLS), and Toronto Raptors (NBA).

• Toronto Wolfpack is Canada’s first ever professional rugby team.

• The famed baseball player Babe Ruth made his first ever home run while playing against the Toronto Maple Leafs at Hanlan’s Point Stadium on the Toronto Islands.

• Rogers Centre (formerly the SkyDome) in Toronto was the world’s first stadium with a motorized fully retractable roof. It was also the last stadium in North America built for both football and baseball. Today it is home to the Toronto Blue Jays.

• Toronto has been a candidate for the Olympics twice, but has never hosted (1996 went to Atlanta, Georgia and 2008 went to Beijing, China). It did however host the 2015 American and Parapan Games, which were twice as large as the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver.

Historical Toronto Facts

• During the last ice age, much of Toronto was below glacial Lake Iroquois. Today, a series of escarpments in the city mark the lake’s former shoreline.

• The first humans passed through the area of Toronto around 11,000 years ago, hunting mammoths and mastodons.

• The first indigenous fishing villages date to around 3000 years ago.

• In 1615, French explorer Étienne Brûlé was probably the first European to step foot on the land that is now Toronto. Traders and missionaries followed.

• In 1720, the French built their first fort at Toronto, Fort Douville, but later abandoned it.

• At the end of the Seven Years’ War between England and France, France lost the area of Toronto to the English.

• After the American Revolutionary War, a wave of English loyalists settlers arrived in the area (along with Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and PEI).

• In 1791, the Canada colony was split into Upper (Ontario) and Lower Canada (Quebec), with Toronto belonging to the former.

• In 1793, Toronto was named York (later Fort York) and was briefly the capital.

• St. James’ Cathedral was built in 1807.

• In 1812, American forces attacked and sacked York.

• The University of Toronto was established in 1827, called King’s College at the time.

• York was incorporated as a city in 1834, taking on the name Toronto, mostly to differentiate it from New York.

• In 1841, Toronto had the first gas-lit street lamps in the country, which Charles Dickens noted when he visited.

• In 1846, the first telegraph in Canada was sent from Toronto to Hamilton.  

• In 1856, the railway from Toronto to Montreal opened.

• In 1861, Toronto’s streetcar service began.

• The first Eaton’s store opened in Toronto in 1869.

• Toronto’s Union Station, at the time the largest train station in Canada, was opened in 1893.

• Much of downtown Toronto was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1904.

• In 1914, the Toronto Blue Shirts, a precursor to the Maple Leafs, won the Stanley Cup.

• The Toronto Subway began running in 1954. Today, it has 4 lines (2 more coming) and over 100 stations either open or coming soon.

• In the 1960s and 70s, many old buildings in Toronto were demolished to make way for new ones, sometimes called the “Manhattanization” of Toronto.

• The CN Tower was built in 1967, becoming the tallest structure in the world until the Burj Khalifa was built in Dubai, UAE in 2007.

• In 1971, Toronto’s population surpassed that of Montreal, becoming the largest city in Canada.

• In 1998, Toronto became much larger when it amalgamated with neighbouring municipalities including York and Scarborough.

• In 2003, SARS arrived in Toronto. The SARS Benefit Concert attraction 450,000 people, making it one of the largest concerts in history.

• From 2010 to 2014, the controversial mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford, urinated in an elementary school’s grounds in daylight, made homophobic and racist statements, admitted to having smoked crack, and more.

• Toronto hosted World Pride in 2014 and the Pan American games in 2015.

• On March 23, 2020, premier Doug Ford called a state of emergency in Toronto due to COVID.