The 10 best saunas in Canada

The flagship of Canada's contrast-therapy wave. A 90-person performance sauna in western red cedar, eight individual ice baths, and an amphitheatre tea lounge. Sessions run as guided classes that range from loud to near-silent.

Vancouver's largest sauna, a 50-person room at 82 to 90°C with aromatherapy aufguss. Four ice baths sit at 0 to 3°C, alongside a tea lounge. After-hours sessions at weekends run lower-lit and music-led.

A floating wood-fired sauna moored at Muskoka Wharf, where the cold plunge is Lake Muskoka itself. Ice is included in winter. Private rentals run from a 35-minute express to a two-hour soak.

Othership's downtown room runs sauna as a guided group ritual. It is a cavernous cedar space with sound and lighting, and paired two-person plunges. Breathwork-led classes finish at an elixir bar.

A purpose-built contrast space on the Shipyards waterfront. There is a 20-plus-person electric sauna and four cold plunges at two temperatures. A heated lounge and an outdoor patio have kombucha on tap.

A Griffintown thermal station built for the ritual, with a roughly 50-seat sauna, a cold plunge and a quiet lounge. Sessions run 75 minutes, guided or free-flow. An in-and-out city reset rather than a destination spa.

A 14-person wood-fired mobile sauna at Cheekye Ranch, with a glacier-fed river for the plunge. Coast Mountains forest backs the site. It is $40 for two hours, with social drop-in nights twice a week.

Contrast therapy as a private affair. Each booking gets its own suite with an Estonian wood sauna and a custom plunge tank, on a guided, digital-free, textile-free 60-minute journey. The opposite of a communal bathhouse.

Nova Scotia's first indoor Nordic spa, on the Dartmouth waterfront. A thermal circuit of sauna and cold sits alongside private infrared rooms. Calm and design-led, and the Atlantic coast's anchor venue.

A floating sauna on Okanagan Lake, with handcrafted Finnish rooms framing lake-and-mountain views. Outdoor plunge pools sit alongside. At its best in the colder months, steam against a half-frozen lake.