Living abroad
Is it legal to burn joss paper where I live?
You are not trying to break any law. You are trying to make an offering. This page will not frighten you, and it will not pretend to be a lawyer telling you “Canada allows it” or “the US does not” — because nobody can answer that. You can, though, and this shows you how in about twenty minutes.
We found no law in Canada, the US, Australia or the UK that mentions joss paper itself. What decides it is up to four separate layers of local rules — every one that applies where you live has to allow it (in the UK it is mainly nuisance law; see below).
Is there a law about burning joss paper?
We went through the published rules for Canada, the United States, Australia and the United Kingdom — four English-speaking countries with long-established Chinese communities, which is why they are the four. We found no provision in any of them about joss paper, spirit money, or ritual burning as such.
So if you have been searching “is burning joss paper legal in Canada” and finding nothing useful — that is not your search technique. You are looking for a joss-paper law, and we could not find one either.
What does exist is several unrelated sets of rules that happen to catch what you want to do.
Which rules decide whether you can burn?
These four are written by different bodies, published on different websites, and none of them will mention the others. Check one, see “allowed”, and stop — and the other three may still say no.
Here is how that trap works in practice. In New South Wales, Australia, a backyard fire pit or barbecue needs no approval at all. That sounds like permission. But the same rules specify what may be used as fuel: dry seasoned wood, LPG, natural gas, and a small quantity of firelighter (source).
So: your fire pit is perfectly legal, and burning joss paper in it still is not compliant. Two separate questions.
How do you check the rules where you live?
You do not need legal training. Four searches, about five minutes each.
1. Your municipal open-burning bylaw
Search [your city] open air burning bylaw or [your city] backyard burning rules. Look for two things: whether open fire is permitted, and which materials may be burned.
This is decided at city or council level, not nationally. The next town over can have entirely different rules. Searching for “Canada” or “Australia” will not give you an answer.
2. Your regional air quality authority
In the US, find your air quality management district. In Australia, your state EPA. In Canada, your municipality or regional district.
This layer asks what you may burn, not whether you may light a fire. In many places “general waste, including paper” is prohibited outright — which covers joss paper without ever naming it.
3. Seasonal fire bans
During drought or fire season, burning can be banned completely regardless of the rules the rest of the year. Search [your area] fire ban or burn ban.
This matters more than it sounds for offerings, because your dates are set by the lunar calendar — they will not politely avoid the dry season.
4. Your own building rules
Lease, strata, body corporate, HOA, balcony clauses. You cannot Google this one; you have to read your documents or ask your building manager.
Even if the first three layers allow it, this one can stop you — and in practice it is the layer that causes trouble fastest, because the person who complains lives next door.
The shop’s own experience is Hong Kong, where all four of these layers are somebody else’s problem: there are public burners, and using them is unremarkable. That is the whole of what we know at first hand, and it is not much use to you.
Everything above is published material we read ourselves on 31 August 2026, with the sources named. We have not lived under any of these rules, and we would rather label the page honestly than let it borrow authority it has not earned.
What do the rules say in Canada, the US, Australia and the UK?
Published information as of 31 August 2026. Rules change, and we are not lawyers — please still work through the four steps above for your own area.
Canada
Toronto: the Ontario Fire Code prohibits open air burning, and an ordinary backyard fire is not permitted. The exception the City lists is a small, confined fire used to cook food on a grill, barbecue or spit, sized to the food being cooked and supervised at all times.
Toronto Fire does, however, grant a Cultural Fire Authorization for “an open air burn conducted in connection with a specific cultural or religious practice, ceremony, or event”. There is no user fee.
You apply in advance using the Ceremonial Fire Information Form, and Toronto Fire inspects the site before issuing a permit (City of Toronto, checked 26 September 2026). The page does not say whether burning joss paper qualifies, and the City's 311 page says permits are not guaranteed — ask Toronto Fire directly.
Surrey, British Columbia: no backyard fires, fire pits, chimineas or open burning of any kind.
There is no national rule — it depends on your municipality.
United States
California: burning general waste, including paper and cardboard, is illegal and enforced by regional air quality management districts.
Note that this is not a question of whether open fire is permitted — burning paper is itself the prohibited act. That is layer two, and it is the one people miss.
Australia
New South Wales: burning vegetation and domestic waste in the open, or in an unauthorised incinerator, is prohibited across all council areas in the Sydney, Wollongong and Newcastle regions, plus the other councils listed in Schedule 1 of the Clean Air Regulation.
Some councils can grant open burning approval. Fire pits and barbecues need no approval, but the fuel restriction described above still applies.
United Kingdom
The UK is genuinely different, and we will not pretend otherwise.
There is no law against having a bonfire. You may light one whenever and as often as you like.
What does apply is the Environmental Protection Act 1990: smoke, fumes or gases emitted from premises so as to be prejudicial to health or a nuisance are a statutory nuisance, and local authorities have a duty to investigate complaints.
Whether something counts as a nuisance turns on frequency, duration, locality and the actual effect on the person complaining. Once or twice a year is unlikely to qualify.
Separately, in a Smoke Control Area it is unlawful to emit smoke from the chimney of a private dwelling from unauthorised fuels.
So if you are in the UK, the answer is quite possibly: you can do this yourself. And if you can, you should — doing it with your own hands is better than paying anyone, including us.
What if you cannot burn where you live?
Not being able to burn does not mean you cannot make an offering.
A photograph, a cup of tea, a stick of incense at home is accepted within the tradition itself; fire is not the requirement people assume it is. The tradition is considerably more flexible than the anxiety around it suggests.
And if you do want the burning done, that is what we exist for: our family shop in Hong Kong writes the packet with your names on it and burns it. Two photographs come back to you: the written packet, and the whole batch together before burning.
Whatever you find when you check: nobody is keeping score. Different families do this differently, and always have. What you can manage is enough.
If this would help
We are not here to remind you of what you have not done. We are here to handle something you already wanted to do.
See the offerings