How to Fill Out and Submit Form IMM 5707: Family Information

Form IMM 5707 is the Family Information form that every applicant aged 18 or older must complete when applying from outside Canada for a temporary resident visa, study permit, or work permit. It gives Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC) the names, dates of birth, addresses, and relationships of your spouse or partner, both parents, and every one of your children, so officers can run background checks and confirm who is in your immediate family. You download the PDF from the IRCC website and open it in Adobe Acrobat Reader version 10 or higher.¹

One boundary to note before you start: IMM 5707 is not the same form as IMM 5645, the Additional Family Information form used for other immigration streams. Check your visa office’s instruction guide to confirm which one applies. Submitting the wrong family information form can cause IRCC to return your entire application as incomplete.²

What to Gather Before You Open the PDF

Most mistakes on this form happen because people start filling it in before they have the details in front of them. Pull the following together for yourself, your spouse or partner, both parents, and every child:

Full legal names exactly as they appear on each person’s passport or travel document, plus names in native script where applicable (for example, Chinese, Arabic, or Cyrillic characters).
Date of birth and country of birth as shown on the passport.
Current address: street name and number, city, country, and postal code.
Current marital status and occupation.
For any deceased parent or child, the city or town, country, and date of death. You still list them.¹

You do not attach marriage or birth certificates to IMM 5707 itself; those go elsewhere in your application. But the names, dates, and relationships you enter here must match those certificates exactly, and any supporting documents not in English or French will need certified translations when you submit the broader package.

How to Fill Out Section A

Section A covers four people: you, your spouse or partner (if any), and both parents. For each one, complete every field: name, native-language name, date of birth, country of birth, current address, marital status, and occupation. You also check “Yes” or “No” to say whether that person will accompany you to Canada.¹

Spouse, Common-Law Partner, or Conjugal Partner

If you are married, the form asks whether you were physically present at the marriage ceremony, with a separate question asking the same about your spouse. That is how IRCC flags proxy marriages for extra review. If you have a common-law or conjugal partner rather than a legal spouse, enter their details in the same area.

If you have no partner of any kind, leave those fields empty, then read “Note 1” at the bottom of Section A and sign and date the declaration confirming you have no partner.¹

Parents

Both parents appear as “Parent 1” and “Parent 2.” Give the same set of details for each. If a parent is deceased, write “deceased” in the address field and add the city, country, and date of death. If a field genuinely does not apply — for instance, you never knew one parent and have no information at all — type “N/A” or “Not applicable” so the officer can see you did not simply skip it.¹

How to Fill Out Section B: Every Child, Without Exception

Section B asks for every child you have, and IRCC means every child. The instructions require you to list:

Biological children
Adopted children
Step-children (children of your spouse or common-law partner)
Children you had who were later adopted by someone else
Children in the custody of an ex-spouse, former partner, or other guardian
Married children, regardless of age
Children who are already permanent residents or citizens of Canada

For each child, provide the relationship (son, adopted daughter, stepdaughter, and so on), full legal name as on the passport, native-language name, date of birth, country of birth, current address, marital status, occupation, and whether the child will accompany you to Canada.¹

If you have no children, check the box labeled “I do not have any children,” then read “Note 2” at the bottom of Section B and sign and date the declaration. A blank Section B without that box checked and that declaration signed is treated as an incomplete form.

Validating and Signing

When every field is filled in, click the “Validate” button at the top of the PDF. If something is missing, a pop-up will tell you what. No pop-up means the form is complete.¹

If you are applying online through the IRCC portal, you do not print and hand-sign the form. The portal applies an electronic signature at the end of the overall submission. If you are submitting on paper, sign and date each declaration area in ink. The form has separate signature blocks for the “no spouse” declaration (Note 1) and the “no children” declaration (Note 2), so sign whichever applies to your situation.

How to Submit the Form

IMM 5707 is never sent on its own. It goes inside your broader visa, study permit, or work permit application.

Online: save the completed PDF and upload it to your IRCC secure account. The file size limit per document is 4 MB. If the file is too large, IRCC suggests reducing the resolution or compressing images before re-saving.³
Paper: include the original signed form in the bundle you send to the Visa Application Centre or Centralized Intake Office listed in your visa office’s instruction guide.

Keep a copy of the completed form. If you later apply for permanent residence, officers will compare the family details across applications for consistency.

Updating Family Information After You Submit

If something changes while your application is being processed — a marriage, a divorce, the birth or adoption of a child, or a death in the family — notify IRCC through the official web form on the IRCC website. Do not send updates by mail. IRCC has stated that mailed updates will not be acknowledged and will not be added to your file, which can delay your application.⁴

What Happens If You Get It Wrong

The cost of an incomplete or inaccurate IMM 5707 is not limited to a returned application. Two consequences under Canadian immigration law can follow you for years.

The Five-Year Misrepresentation Ban

Under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, anyone who directly or indirectly misrepresents or withholds material facts on an immigration application is inadmissible to Canada. That includes leaving a child off the IMM 5707 or lying about a spouse’s existence. A formal finding of misrepresentation triggers a five-year bar on entering Canada, running from the date of that determination (or, for someone already in Canada, from the date a removal order is enforced).⁵ For permanent residents, a misrepresentation finding can lead to a removal order after a hearing before the Immigration Division.

The Lifetime Sponsorship Bar for Undisclosed Family

The longer-term risk is the family-class sponsorship bar. If you become a permanent resident and, at the time of that application, you had a family member who was not listed and not examined by an immigration officer, that family member is permanently barred from being sponsored under the family class. The bar applies whether the omission was intentional, accidental, or the result of bad advice. The only route around it is an exemption on humanitarian and compassionate grounds, which is difficult and never guaranteed.⁶

In practical terms: if you leave a child off your IMM 5707 during a work permit application and later transition to permanent residence without correcting the record, you may never be able to bring that child to Canada through family sponsorship. Getting the form right the first time is far easier than trying to undo it.

1
Canada.ca. Family Information Form – Visitors, Students and Workers (IMM 5707)
2
Justice Laws Website. Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations – Section 10
3
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. Is There a File Size Limit for Documents I Upload to My Account
4
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada. How Can I Update or Ask About an IRCC Application in Progress
5
Justice Laws Website. Immigration and Refugee Protection Act – Section 40 – Misrepresentation
6
Justice Laws Website. Immigration and Refugee Protection Regulations – Section 117