How much does it cost to fix a frozen pipe in Toronto?

If the pipe is frozen and has not split, thawing it is $200 to $500 (BOS Plumbing; Ottawa Pro Plumbing quotes $200 to $400). If it has burst, repairing an exposed run is $400 to $900 and repairing one behind drywall or a ceiling is $800 to $3,000 (Toronto Plumbing Pros, widened to BOS Plumbing's upper figure). On top of either, most 24-hour Toronto plumbers charge a flat dispatch fee of $100 to $150.

Why is the pipe not leaking if it burst?

Because the ice is plugging the hole. This is the cruellest part of a frozen pipe and the reason people get caught out: the split happens while everything is frozen solid, and nothing comes out until the thaw. If a tap has stopped running in a Toronto January, find your main shutoff valve and know how to close it before anything warms up, and keep the tap open so meltwater has somewhere to go that is not the wall.

What does a plumber charge per hour here?

Standard business-hours labour in Toronto runs $90 to $180 an hour, and evenings, weekends and holidays run $200 to $350 an hour (BOS Plumbing; Toronto Plumbing Pros), usually billed in minimum one-hour increments. Emergency work also carries a surcharge of $75 to $150 on top of the rate. Ask one specific question when you book: whether the dispatch fee comes off the total or is charged on top of it.

Which pipes actually freeze in a Toronto house?

The ones on the cold side of the insulation. Runs through an unheated garage, along an exterior wall in a cold room, in a crawlspace, in an uninsulated attic, and the outdoor hose bib nobody drained in October. A pipe in a heated basement almost never freezes; the same pipe six feet along, where it passes an open rim joist, does. That is also why the exposed-versus-hidden question changes the price so much: the cheap repairs are the ones you can see.

Does insurance cover a burst pipe?

Sudden and accidental escape of water from a burst supply pipe inside the home is the classic covered event on a standard Ontario policy, so this is a case where phoning your insurer promptly usually helps. Two things commonly reduce or void it: leaving a house unheated or unattended for an extended period in winter without shutting off and draining the water, and damage that turns out to be slow seepage rather than a sudden burst. Read your own wording on both.

Is the plumber's number the whole bill?

Only if no water got out. Once it has soaked drywall, insulation or a floor, a restoration company prices that separately: a clean-water job is quoted at $1,000 to $4,000, and taking drywall out and putting it back is $300 to $4,000. That is the gap that surprises people. One Toronto plumber puts the whole emergency, plumbing plus the finishes, at $1,000 to $10,000 once structural repair is involved.

Frozen and burst pipe repair cost in Toronto

A frozen pipe is cheap. A burst pipe is not, and a burst pipe that ran for an hour into a finished wall is a different order of problem again. Thawing a pipe that has not split is $200 to $500. Repairing one that has is $400 to $900 exposed, $800 to $3,000 behind drywall. Then, if water got out, a restoration company writes a second invoice the plumber never mentioned.

This calculator shows those two bills apart, because that is how they arrive.

Page last updated: September 13, 2026By The RestorationIndex Desk

The numbers behind it

$200 to $500thawing a pipe that has not split (BOS Plumbing; Ottawa Pro Plumbing)
$400 to $900repairing a burst on an exposed run (Toronto Plumbing Pros)
$800 to $3,000repairing a burst behind drywall or a ceiling
$1,000 to $10,000the whole emergency once finishes have to be repaired (BOS Plumbing)

How bad is it, and what does that cost?

Has it split?

A frozen pipe often does not reveal the split until it thaws, because the ice is what is plugging the hole. If a tap has stopped running in a Toronto January, treat it as a possible burst and know where your shutoff valve is before anything warms up.

Can you see the pipe?

When are you calling?

Water got out and soaked somethingDrywall, insulation, flooring, a ceiling below. This is the bill a plumber does not quote.

The plumbing bill

$375 to $800

Before 13% HST. Toronto plumber labour runs $90 to $180 an hour in business hours and $200 to $350 outside them, which is what sits inside these job prices.

Getting a plumber to the doorToronto Plumbing Pros: $100 to $150
Evening, weekend or holiday surchargeToronto Plumbing Pros: $75 to $150
Thawing the pipe, which has not splitBOS Plumbing: $200 to $500

No water escaped, so there is no restoration bill. That is the whole difference between a few hundred dollars and a few thousand, and it is decided in the minutes between the pipe splitting and somebody closing the main valve.

Three bills from one cold night

The reason a frozen pipe surprises people financially is that the trades split it three ways and nobody quotes the whole thing. A plumber quotes getting there and thawing or repairing. A restoration company quotes extraction, drying and the tear-out. A general contractor, or the same restoration company wearing a different hat, quotes putting the wall and floor back. Each of those numbers is reasonable on its own and none of them is the answer to the question you asked.

Access decides the plumbing half. The same twelve inches of copper is a $400 job on an exposed basement run and a $3,000 job when it sits behind finished drywall in a ceiling, because the work is no longer the pipe, it is finding it, opening the room, and closing it again afterwards. If you have ever wondered why a plumber wants to know exactly which tap stopped running, that is why.

Toronto adds one specific hazard the rest of the plumbing world talks about less. Our freeze-thaw cycle means pipes do not simply freeze once in January and stay frozen; they freeze and release repeatedly through the winter, and the fitting that survived four of those cycles fails on the fifth. Insulating the cold-side runs and the rim joist is the unglamorous, cheap fix, and it is the one that never gets done in November.

If water did get out, the drying half is priced properly by the water damage calculator, and the drying time estimator says how many days the equipment has to stay before anybody can close the wall.

Frequently asked questions

How much does it cost to fix a frozen pipe in Toronto?: If the pipe is frozen and has not split, thawing it is $200 to $500 (BOS Plumbing; Ottawa Pro Plumbing quotes $200 to $400). If it has burst, repairing an exposed run is $400 to $900 and repairing one behind drywall or a ceiling is $800 to $3,000 (Toronto Plumbing Pros, widened to BOS Plumbing's upper figure). On top of either, most 24-hour Toronto plumbers charge a flat dispatch fee of $100 to $150.
Why is the pipe not leaking if it burst?: Because the ice is plugging the hole. This is the cruellest part of a frozen pipe and the reason people get caught out: the split happens while everything is frozen solid, and nothing comes out until the thaw. If a tap has stopped running in a Toronto January, find your main shutoff valve and know how to close it before anything warms up, and keep the tap open so meltwater has somewhere to go that is not the wall.
What does a plumber charge per hour here?: Standard business-hours labour in Toronto runs $90 to $180 an hour, and evenings, weekends and holidays run $200 to $350 an hour (BOS Plumbing; Toronto Plumbing Pros), usually billed in minimum one-hour increments. Emergency work also carries a surcharge of $75 to $150 on top of the rate. Ask one specific question when you book: whether the dispatch fee comes off the total or is charged on top of it.
Which pipes actually freeze in a Toronto house?: The ones on the cold side of the insulation. Runs through an unheated garage, along an exterior wall in a cold room, in a crawlspace, in an uninsulated attic, and the outdoor hose bib nobody drained in October. A pipe in a heated basement almost never freezes; the same pipe six feet along, where it passes an open rim joist, does. That is also why the exposed-versus-hidden question changes the price so much: the cheap repairs are the ones you can see.
Does insurance cover a burst pipe?: Sudden and accidental escape of water from a burst supply pipe inside the home is the classic covered event on a standard Ontario policy, so this is a case where phoning your insurer promptly usually helps. Two things commonly reduce or void it: leaving a house unheated or unattended for an extended period in winter without shutting off and draining the water, and damage that turns out to be slow seepage rather than a sudden burst. Read your own wording on both.
Is the plumber's number the whole bill?: Only if no water got out. Once it has soaked drywall, insulation or a floor, a restoration company prices that separately: a clean-water job is quoted at $1,000 to $4,000, and taking drywall out and putting it back is $300 to $4,000. That is the gap that surprises people. One Toronto plumber puts the whole emergency, plumbing plus the finishes, at $1,000 to $10,000 once structural repair is involved.

Where these numbers come from

The plumbing figures were collected in August 2026 from Toronto and Ontario plumbing companies that publish their own rates. The restoration figures come from RestorationIndex's existing water damage pricing file rather than being copied into a second one, so a correction there reaches this page as well. Where two Canadian sources gave different numbers for the same line, the range holds both: the behind-drywall repair, the hourly rate and the emergency call fee are all widened that way. One figure a search engine attributed to a Toronto plumber was dropped after the page was fetched and did not contain it.

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