How to find and win government tenders in Winnipeg (2026)
Where the City of Winnipeg posts construction tenders — now MERX-only — plus the provincial and federal layers, and what it takes to win as a Winnipeg contractor.
By Joseph Morrison · Founder, Cornerstone Contracts
Winnipeg recently made finding its tenders simpler in one way and stricter in another: as of March 1, 2025, City of Winnipeg bid opportunities live on a single platform — MERX — and nowhere else. That's good news for discovery and a hard requirement for bidding. Here's how Winnipeg public construction work gets posted and how to win it.
Where Winnipeg posts its tenders
Since March 1, 2025, the City of Winnipeg posts all open bid opportunities on MERX, and bids must be submitted electronically through MERX. They no longer appear on the City website. The City posts the full range there — Tenders, RFPs, EOIs, RFIs, and RFQs.
Two further streams matter:
- Provincial work — Manitoba government and Crown entities — tenders through the province's channels and MERX.
- Federal work in the Winnipeg region posts on CanadaBuys.
Who's buying
The City's departments — public works, water and waste, planning and property, and transit — carry the municipal construction volume, alongside the City's agencies. Manitoba ministries and the health and education sectors add the institutional layer, and federal facilities in the region round it out.
How to register and bid
- Register on MERX and set up notifications for current opportunities — registration is free, though set-up requires a credit card on file. There's no charge to view City of Winnipeg documents; fees apply only when you submit a bid.
- If you're unsure about a requirement, contact the Contracts Officer named on the MERX posting or the Contract Administrator in the documents — clarification before you bid is free and prevents non-compliant submissions.
- For the federal stream, see our CanadaBuys guide for contractors; for getting the most out of MERX, our MERX guide for Canadian construction.
What it takes to win
- Bonding and insurance scale with project size; larger City work typically requires performance and labour-and-material payment bonds.
- A complete, responsive submission beats a rushed one — most lost public bids are lost on compliance, not price. See our guide to winning Canadian construction tenders.
See what's open in Winnipeg now
Browse the open construction tenders in Winnipeg right now — free, no account — and the full list of open tenders by city and province beside it. More city how-to guides: Toronto, Ottawa, and Hamilton.
The City's move to a single MERX feed helps, but you still wade through national noise to find Winnipeg fits — and you still draft every proposal from scratch. Cornerstone Contracts scans the portals that carry Winnipeg work every day, scores each posting against your trade, region, and project size, and drafts a compliance-aware proposal for any tender you want to pursue. Start free to see your matched Winnipeg opportunities in one feed.
Portal coverage and access terms change. Confirm current details on each provider's site before relying on them.