What CRA category is Google Ads for a website?

For CRA purposes, Google Ads is generally treated as an advertising or marketing business expense if it was paid to earn business income.

If you’re filing Form T2125 as a sole proprietor or self-employed person, it is commonly entered under Advertising. If you keep business books for a corporation, it would usually still be tracked as an advertising / marketing expense.

A few important tax points:

• The ad spend itself is usually deductible as a business expense.
• If you are GST/HST-registered, the GST/HST charged on the Google Ads invoice is generally claimed as an input tax credit (ITC), not deducted as an income tax expense.
• If you are not GST/HST-registered, the tax paid is usually included in the business expense amount.

If you meant website costs rather than ads:

• Google Ads = advertising / marketing
• Domain registration and hosting = often categorized as website or office-related operating expenses, depending on your bookkeeping setup
• Building a brand-new website may need different treatment, depending on whether it is a current expense or a capital cost

Exact tax treatment can depend on how the expense was incurred and how your books are set up, so if you want, I can help you map it to QuickBooks, Xero, or T2125 categories.