Here’s All Eight CPL Home Openers For 2025

With the full schedule for the 2025 Canadian Premier League season set to arrive on Wednesday, Canada’s top flight has revealed all eight home openers in advance of the big announcement.

The 2025 CPL season will kick off on April 5, with each club’s respective home opener taking place over the course of the next twenty days. With no stadium turf renovation delaying the festivities, that means that Winnipeg’s Valour FC will enjoy a much earlier start to home games this year.

The first matchweek of the league’s seventh season will see Ontario and west coast sides split hosting duties, with Atletico Ottawa, Forge FC, Pacific FC, and Vancouver FC opening the festivities as hosts.

Atletico Ottawa and its new head coach Diego Mejia will host the Halifax Wanderers at 2:00PM EST, while Forge – you guessed it – will host Cavalry at Hamilton Stadium (title pending) at 4:30PM, marking the fourth times the two have met on the league’s opening day. Given how the final went, it’s expected to be a fiery match.

To close out an action-packed Saturday, Pacific will then host Valour at Starlight Stadium at 7:00PM EST. Sunday’s lone match will see Vancouver FC test out its new general admission seating plan as it hosts York United at 7:00PM EST on the lower mainland.

The following week will see York United host Halifax Wanderers on Sunday, April 13 at 3:00PM EST, with matchweek three seeing Cavalry FC receive Vancouver FC at ATCO Field on Friday, April 18 at 7:00PM EST and Halifax host host long-haul visitors Pacific FC at Wanderers Grounds on Saturday, April 19 at 3:30PM EST.

Valour’s home opener will clock in last in the fourth matchweek, with the club hosting Halifax Wanderers – who will be the away team in no less than three home openers – at Princess Auto Stadium on Friday, April 25 at 8:00PM EST.

“This coming season is expected to be highly competitive, promising to excite our passionate fanbases across the country,” says CPL Executive Vice President Costa Smyrniotis. “It is also an excellent way for new fans to connect with a community-centric sport that is going to explode in Canada in the coming 16 months and beyond. We look forward to kicking off in each of our CPL communities in April.”

With the amount of teams remaining locked at eight for the sixth year in a row (though the teams themselves have changed, with FC Edmonton dropping out in 2022 and Vancouver FC subsequently kicking off the following spring), the number of games for the season remains unchanged at 112, with five playoff matches leading up to the 2025 CPL Final that will take place in November.

The Wanderers Notebook reports that the league has decided on two expansion locations hoping to launch in 2026. Granted, that timeline still lags behind what commissioner Mark Noonan had said two years ago when he ambitiously promised ‘at least’ two teams would join by 2025, and a further two – for four new teams in all – by 2026.

While Onesoccer has undergone a shift in ownership since Timeless Inc and Mediapro severed ties, fans who subscribe to the streaming service will once again be able to catch each match, with the Onesoccer channel still available on fuboTV and Telus Optik TV as well.

While the dispute between OneSoccer and Rogers is still ongoing, there is no formal word on the Canadian Premier League being picked up by further linear channels. On the backend, Dome Productions will help produce a few of the earlier matches before OneSoccer takes over the full slate of the season.

Header Image Photo Credit: David Chant