Alberta CVIP Inspection Guide: What's Checked, How Often, and How to Pass

A plain-language guide to Alberta's Commercial Vehicle Inspection Program (CVIP) for truck, trailer and bus owners. It covers who needs an inspection, when it expires, what gets checked, and what to fix before you book. Every rule here comes from Alberta's own regulation and inspection manual.

What is a CVIP inspection?

CVIP is Alberta's Commercial Vehicle Inspection Program. It's a safety inspection every 12 months for trucks, tractors and trailers, and every 6 months for buses. Only a licensed technician at a facility licensed by the province can do it.

When a unit passes, the technician issues a commercial vehicle inspection certificate and puts a decal on the unit. Every inspection, pass or fail, comes with a record of inspection that lists what was found.

The checks follow a national standard: National Safety Code Standard 11, Part B, which Alberta adopts in its Commercial Vehicle Inspection Manual. Because every province uses the same standard, an Alberta CVIP is accepted across Canada.

Who needs one?

Under Alberta's Vehicle Inspection Program, these units need a CVIP:

• Trucks, truck-tractors, semi-trailers and trailers with a registered gross vehicle weight of 11,794 kg or more that run only in Alberta.
• The same units over 4,500 kg if they run outside Alberta.
• Buses with more than 10 seats, including the driver, unless used only for personal use.

The registered weight is the number that counts, not what the unit happens to weigh that day.

When does a CVIP expire?

A certificate and its decal start on the day they're issued. Under section 30 of Alberta's Vehicle Inspection Regulation, they expire at the end of the 12th month from the month they were issued. For a bus, it's the 6th month. A unit with a permanently mounted mobile service rig gets 60 months.

To run a commercial vehicle on an Alberta highway, section 19 says all of these must be true:

• The unit has a valid certificate and decal that haven't expired.
• A signed copy of the certificate is in the unit.
• The decal is fixed to the unit the way the inspection manual says.

The driver must show the certificate to a peace officer or investigator who asks for it (section 21).

What if it has expired?

Running a commercial vehicle without a valid certificate and decal breaks section 19 of the regulation. The national standard notes that fines apply. There is one exception: section 21 lets you drive the unit directly to a licensed facility to get it inspected.

What does the technician check?

The national standard has 10 sections, plus an appendix for propane and natural gas fuel systems:

• Power train: exhaust, fuel system, drive shaft, belts and engine mounts
• Suspension: springs, air suspension, axles and their mounts
• Brakes: air and hydraulic systems, chambers, slack adjusters, drums, linings, air supply and ABS
• Steering: linkage, power steering and kingpins
• Instruments and equipment: horn, wipers and washer, speedometer, heater and defroster
• Lamps: every required lamp, reflectors and reflective markings
• Electrical: wiring, battery and the trailer cord
• Body: frame, cab, doors, windshield, mirrors, seats and seat belts, mud flaps, landing gear and rear impact guard
• Tires and wheels: tread, sidewalls, pressure, hubs, rims and wheel nuts
• Coupling devices: fifth wheel, pintle hook and safety chains

Most checks are visual. Some need a test or a measurement, such as brake stroke, tread depth and air pressure. If any "reject if" condition in the standard is found, the unit fails and no decal can be issued until it's fixed.

Brakes may need to come apart. Depending on the brake type, some inspections need the drums pulled. On a truck or trailer, a documented full inspection with the drums off lets later inspections be "limited" (drums left on) for 19 months. Disc brakes need the wheels off at least every 12 months. To get credit for a past brake job, bring the paperwork: date, odometer, VIN, drum and lining measurements, and the technician's and shop's details.

What fails most often?

Alberta doesn't publish CVIP failure rates, and we found no published figures (October 2026). Roadside checks give a clue. In the Commercial Vehicle Safety Alliance's 2025 International Roadcheck (56,178 inspections across Canada, the US and Mexico), brake problems were 41.1% of vehicle out-of-service violations (brake systems 24.4%, plus brakes out of adjustment), and tires were 21.4%. Roadside rules are similar to the CVIP standard, but not the same.

Pre-inspection checklist

These checks use the limits in the national standard. Doing them a week or two before the inspection gives time to fix what you find.

• Lights: turn on the headlights, marker lights, signals and four-ways, and have someone press the brake. A required lamp fails if it's out, cracked, missing or covered, or if 25% or more of its LEDs are out. On an LED headlamp, a single dead LED fails.
• Air leaks: with the system at full pressure, walk around and listen. On a truck or trailer, any leak you can hear fails. A truck also fails if pressure drops more than 7 kPa (1 psi) a minute. A trailer hooked to a tractor fails if it loses more than 28 kPa (4 psi) in one minute.
• Air build-up (truck): one of the allowed tests times the rise from 85 to 100 psi at 600 to 800 rpm, and it fails if that takes more than 2 minutes. The governor must cut out between 828 and 1,000 kPa (120 to 145 psi) and cut in at 690 kPa (100 psi) or higher. The low-air warning must come on when pressure drops below 414 kPa (60 psi).
• Brake stroke: with 90 to 100 psi in the tanks, the spring brakes released, the engine off and the service brakes fully applied, measure each push rod's stroke (stroke indicators help you spot an over-stroke). A brake fails at or past its limit, for example 51 mm (2 in.) on a type 30 chamber or 64 mm (2½ in.) on a type 30 long-stroke. Strokes on one axle can't differ by more than 6 mm.
• Self-adjusting slack adjusters: if a brake is out of stroke, it needs repair. The manual says adjusting it by hand won't fix the problem.
• Tread depth: measure at the lowest spot in a main groove, not on a wear bar. A front tire fails under 3 mm, other tires under 2 mm. Retreads aren't allowed on a steering axle that's turned by the steering wheel.
• Tire pressure: a tire fails if it's more than 10% above or below the recommended pressure, or if two tires in a dual set differ by more than 10%.
• Wipers and washer (truck): the wipers must work at every speed and park, the blades can't be hard or torn, and the washer must spray where it should.
• Paperwork: bring records of any recent brake inspection or brake job, so they can count toward the brake check.

For help with what you find, see air brake repair, truck electrical repair for lights and wiring, and semi trailer repair. A PM service before the due date covers many of the same items.

If the unit fails

You get a record of inspection listing what failed. Under section 31 of the regulation, if the failed items are fixed and the unit comes back with that record within 10 days, the technician only has to re-check the items that failed.

Some faults are "hazardous conditions". These are so unsafe the unit shouldn't go back on the road until they're fixed. Examples include a brake past its stroke limit, a truck losing more than 20 kPa (3 psi) of air a minute, or a front tire under 2 mm of tread. The national standard says most provinces let you have the repairs done at the inspection facility, or have the unit towed or hauled to another shop.

How to find a licensed facility

Use Alberta's free Vehicle Inspection Facility Search. Choose the commercial inspection type and search by city or postal code. On 29 October 2026 it listed 316 licensed commercial inspection facilities in Edmonton, 43 in Nisku, 37 in Leduc and 37 in Acheson. Many are fleets' own in-house shops that don't take outside work. See Nisku and Leduc and Acheson for more about those areas.

A facility's licence covers certain types of vehicle, so ask whether it's licensed for your unit: truck, trailer or bus. Alberta doesn't set a CVIP fee, and we found no Edmonton heavy duty shop publishing one (October 2026). Ask for the inspection price and the labour rate for any repairs before you book.