Shipping a car from Montreal to St. John's covers 2,139 km and typically takes 5–9 days from pickup to delivery. The route runs Highway 20 east through Quebec and New Brunswick to North Sydney, Nova Scotia, crosses to Newfoundland aboard a Marine Atlantic ferry, then continues the length of the island on Highway 1 to St. John's. Red Foot Haulers moves vehicles on this exact corridor within Canada only.
Route at a Glance
| Distance | 2139 km |
| Estimated Transit Time | 5–9 days |
| Route | Highway 20 east through Quebec and New Brunswick to North Sydney, Nova Scotia, then the Marine Atlantic ferry crossing to Port aux Basques, and Highway 1 the length of Newfoundland to St. John’s. |
Shipping a Car from Montreal to St. John's
This is a long-haul, cross-provincial, cross-water move, and it behaves differently from a mainland-to-mainland shipment of the same distance. A car travelling 2,139 km entirely by road — say Montreal to Halifax — is a matter of driving hours and hours-of-service rules. A car travelling to St. John's has to clear a scheduled ferry crossing partway through, and that single fact governs almost everything else on this page: the width of the transit window, the reason winter bookings need more slack, and the reason this route needs its own page rather than being folded into a generic car shipping Canada estimate.
If you're shipping a vehicle that starts or ends in Montreal but isn't going to Newfoundland, our Montreal car shipping page covers pricing and process for that city's other lanes. This page is specific to the Montreal–St. John's pair and the ferry logistics that come with it.
The Route
From Montreal, the carrier runs Highway 20 east across Quebec, picking up Highway 2 through New Brunswick, then onward into Nova Scotia to the port town of North Sydney on Cape Breton Island. That leg alone is roughly 1,250 km of mainland driving under normal hours-of-service rules — a driver can't simply run it straight through, and rest breaks are built into the schedule.
At North Sydney the vehicle boards a Marine Atlantic ferry for the crossing to Port aux Basques, Newfoundland — a scheduled sailing, not a continuous drive, of roughly six to eight hours. This is the part of the route that most car shipping content skips over, and it's the part that actually determines your delivery window. A carrier can't simply drive faster to make up time lost here; it has to be booked onto a specific sailing, and if that sailing doesn't run, nothing moves until the next one does.
Once ashore at Port aux Basques, there's still about 900 km of Highway 1 — the Trans-Canada Highway across the island — to reach St. John's. That's a full day-plus of driving in its own right, through terrain and weather that can be considerably rougher than the Quebec and Maritime legs, particularly outside summer.
So the 2,139 km breaks down roughly as: ~1,250 km of mainland highway to North Sydney, a ferry crossing that isn't measured in kilometres at all, and ~900 km the length of Newfoundland. It's the middle piece — the sailing schedule, not the driving — that makes the 5–9 day window as wide as it is, and winter sailings are cancelled for weather more often than most people moving a car for the first time expect.
Open vs Enclosed Transport
Most vehicles moving on this lane ship on open carriers, and for the large majority of cars, that's entirely appropriate — it's not a compromise, it's the standard method the whole industry is built around. Enclosed car shipping exists for a smaller set of vehicles where the extra protection is actually worth arranging around: classics, exotics, anything with very low ground clearance, a car straight out of restoration, or anything whose value makes weather and road grime exposure a real risk rather than a cosmetic one.
| Factor | Open Transport | Enclosed Transport |
|---|---|---|
| Weather & road debris exposure | Exposed to elements and highway spray for the full 2,139 km | Fully enclosed, no exposure |
| Vehicles per load | Typically 7–10 vehicles per carrier | Typically 1–2 vehicles per carrier |
| Availability on this lane | Widely available; most trucks running Quebec–Atlantic Canada are open carriers | Limited; fewer enclosed carriers regularly run this far east, so lead time is longer |
| Best suited to | Daily drivers, standard sedans, SUVs, trucks — the majority of vehicles | Classics, exotics, low-clearance sports cars, recent restorations, high-value collector vehicles |
What Your Quote Depends On
We don't publish a flat per-kilometre rate, because the honest answer is that no two vehicles on this route cost the same to move — the variables below do the actual work of setting the number, and knowing them ahead of time is what lets you get an accurate quote instead of a guess.
| Factor | How it moves the quote |
|---|---|
| Distance and distance tier | 2,139 km puts this route firmly in long-haul territory; long routes generally move at a lower rate per kilometre than short ones, but the ferry leg adds a fixed component that shorter mainland routes don't carry. |
| Open vs enclosed transport | Enclosed sits higher because far fewer vehicles fit per load and fewer carriers run enclosed trailers on this lane at all, so availability itself carries a premium. |
| Vehicle size, weight and ground clearance | Larger, heavier vehicles take up more deck space and reduce how many other vehicles fit on the same load; low-clearance vehicles may need specific ramp or trailer configurations. |
| Whether it runs, rolls and steers | A non-running vehicle needs a winch-equipped carrier and takes longer to load, which uses more of the driver's time and equipment for the same trip. |
| Season and weather | Winter sailings are more likely to be delayed or cancelled by Marine Atlantic, and carriers account for the schedule risk and the extra handling that ice and snow add at both ends. |
| Flexibility of the pickup window | A rigid date can force a carrier to run a load with an empty slot or wait on a specific sailing; a flexible window lets them slot your vehicle into a truck and a ferry booking that's already efficient. |
| Distance from a main highway | An address well off Highway 20, Highway 2, or Highway 1 adds driving time on both ends that a highway-adjacent address doesn't. |
| How regularly carriers run this lane | Montreal–Atlantic Canada is a lane carriers already run; Montreal to St. John's specifically depends on ferry coordination, so it's less automatically "on the way" than a mainland-only route. |
On this particular corridor, three of these tend to dominate: the ferry-driven season and weather risk, how flexible your pickup window is, and whether your vehicle runs, rolls and steers normally. Distance and vehicle size matter, but they're fixed the moment you book; those three are the ones you can actually influence.
The Marine Atlantic Ferry Crossing
This crossing is the defining constraint on the whole route, and it's worth understanding on its own terms rather than as a footnote to the driving. Marine Atlantic operates the year-round route between North Sydney, Nova Scotia and Port aux Basques, Newfoundland, with a crossing time of roughly six to eight hours depending on conditions. Carriers don't show up and drive on — vehicle space is booked ahead of time, the same way freight space on any ferry is, and a carrier's schedule for your shipment is built around a specific sailing slot.
That booking dependency is exactly why winter matters so much on this route. Between December and March, high winds and heavy seas on the Cabot Strait cause real, non-trivial cancellation rates — this isn't a rare event, it's a normal part of winter scheduling in that part of the Atlantic. When a sailing is cancelled, every vehicle booked onto it moves to the next available sailing, and depending on how backed up the schedule already is, that can add a day or more that has nothing to do with the driving on either side.
There is a second option worth knowing about even though it's seasonal: Marine Atlantic also runs a summer service to Argentia, Newfoundland, which lands considerably closer to St. John's than Port aux Basques does and can shorten the on-island driving leg substantially. It only operates during the warmer months, so it isn't a fallback for a winter shipment, but it's part of why summer transit times on this lane can run toward the shorter end of the 5–9 day window while winter transit times run toward the longer end.
None of this is a reason to avoid shipping to Newfoundland in winter — it's a reason to book with realistic expectations and, where the date allows it, some slack around the calendar.
How Long It Takes, and What Changes That
The 5–9 day window is carrier transit time, not raw drive time, and the difference matters. Inside that window sit federally mandated driver rest periods, the reality that your vehicle is one of several being picked up and dropped off along a multi-stop route, and the width of the pickup window you agreed to at booking. None of that is padding — it's what a legitimate carrier operation actually looks like, and it's the same on every long-haul lane, not just this one.
What widens it specifically on the Montreal–St. John's route: a cancelled or delayed Marine Atlantic sailing, winter conditions on either the Quebec/Maritime highways or the Trans-Canada across Newfoundland, and a tight or inflexible pickup date that doesn't line up well with an available truck and ferry slot. What narrows it: booking with a flexible pickup date rather than a fixed one, since that lets the carrier fit your vehicle onto a truck and sailing that's already efficient rather than scheduling one around your date specifically. Flexible dates are, by a wide margin, the single biggest lever a customer actually controls.
Preparing Your Vehicle for Pickup
A little preparation the day before pickup avoids most of the friction that slows a loading appointment down or creates a dispute later. Work through this before the driver arrives:
- Fuel level: around a quarter tank — enough to load and unload the vehicle under its own power, not so much that you're paying to haul extra weight across 2,139 km.
- Toll transponders: remove any Highway 407 or similar transponder so it doesn't get charged in transit on a route you're not driving.
- Personal belongings: take everything out of the car. Carrier cargo insurance covers the vehicle itself, not the contents inside it.
- Alarm system: disable it. A car that trips its own alarm partway through a multi-day trip is a real, recurring problem for drivers and other vehicles on the load.
- Damage documentation: photograph the vehicle from every angle in good light, with a timestamp, before the driver arrives — scratches, dents, curb rash on wheels, windshield chips, all of it.
- Aftermarket parts: fold in mirrors, remove or fold down aftermarket spoilers, and take off roof racks or roof boxes that add height or aren't secured for highway speed.
- Starting quirks: if the vehicle needs a specific procedure to start, has a weak battery, or has any known mechanical idiosyncrasy, write it down for the driver rather than assuming it'll come up in conversation.
- Tires and parking brake: confirm all four tires hold air and that the parking brake releases cleanly — both are needed to load and unload the vehicle safely.
At pickup, the driver will complete a condition report noting the vehicle's existing state before it's loaded. This document — not your memory of the car's condition, and not the photos alone — is what any later claim gets settled against, so it's worth walking the vehicle with the driver and agreeing on it together before it goes on the truck.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long does it take to ship a car from Montreal to St. John's?
Typically 5–9 days for this 2,139 km route. That window is carrier transit, not raw drive time — it accounts for mandated driver rest, the other vehicles being collected and dropped along the way, and the pickup window itself. Winter weather widens it; a flexible pickup date usually narrows it.
What is the cheapest way to ship a car within Canada?
Open transport on a multi-vehicle carrier, booked with a flexible pickup window, on a lane carriers already run regularly. Those three together do most of the work: enclosed trailers carry a fraction of the vehicles per load, a rigid pickup date means a carrier may run with an empty slot, and an established lane is one where the truck is already going. Terminal-to-terminal instead of door-to-door helps where a terminal is genuinely convenient to you.
Does shipping a car to Newfoundland involve a ferry?
Yes, necessarily — there is no road onto the island. Vehicles cross with Marine Atlantic from North Sydney, Nova Scotia to Port aux Basques, a sailing of roughly six to eight hours that the carrier books space on in advance. From Port aux Basques it is still about 900 km of Highway 1 to St. John's.
Can weather delay a car shipment to Newfoundland?
More than on any mainland route. Marine Atlantic cancels sailings in high winds and heavy seas, most often between December and March, and a cancelled crossing pushes everything behind it to the next available sailing. That is the main reason to allow extra time on a winter move rather than book to a tight date.
Can you ship a car that does not run?
Yes. A non-running vehicle needs a carrier with a winch and takes a loading slot that a driveable car would not, so it has to be arranged deliberately rather than added at the last minute. Tell us at booking whether it rolls, steers and brakes — those three determine what equipment the driver brings, and a vehicle that does none of them needs different handling entirely.
Is my car insured while it is being transported?
Yes. Every vehicle moves under the carrier's cargo insurance for the whole trip. Ask for the certificate and check the per-vehicle limit against what your car is actually worth — that matters most for enclosed loads, which is usually where the higher-value vehicles are. Your own policy generally still covers the vehicle as an owned asset, but not the carrier's handling of it, so the two are not interchangeable.
Can Red Foot Haulers ship my car to or from the United States?
No — Red Foot Haulers ships within Canada only. Bringing a vehicle in from the US involves customs clearance, Registrar of Imported Vehicles (RIV) registration and a federal inspection, all of which sit outside domestic transport. Contact the CBSA or RIV directly for that process.
Other Popular Routes
If you're weighing options around Atlantic Canada more broadly, see St. John's to Halifax car shipping and car shipping to Halifax. For the full national picture, our car shipping Canada hub covers every corridor we run, and our enclosed car shipping Canada page details enclosed transport specifics for high-value vehicles across the country.