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If you’ve ever shopped at Costco, then you probably have a favourite location you prefer to visit — and one you’d rather avoid.
The number of fellow shoppers, the parking situation, how busy the surrounding area is and even the travel time can all play a factor in deciding where to shop.
New research from the experts at seobacklinks.com looked at listings for 101 Costco warehouses across Canada in October 2026, each with at least 1,000 Google reviews, and analyzed customer comments and star ratings.
‘Too crowded’
All 10 of the lowest-rated Costco warehouses in Ontario were in the GTA, including two of Mississauga’s four stores.
The Yorktech Dr. location in Markham and the Biscayne Cres. store in Brampton tied for last place.
The Yorktech location’s parking lot was described as “crazy,” although shoppers lauded its “good selection of goods.” The Biscayne location, meanwhile, was criticized for simply being “too crowded.”
Mississauga’s Laird store, Richmond Hill’s warehouse on John Birchall Rd. and another Mississauga location in Heartland were in a three-way tie for third-last place.
Their poor reviews appeared to be customer service-related; at the Laird store, one customer waited half an hour for a price match that didn’t end up happening, while the Heartland employees were accused of not answering the phone.
Others complained that the Richmond Hill warehouse no longer offers tire services.
The Warden and Ellesmere location in Scarborough, the Billy Bishop Way store in North York, the Harry Walker Pkwy. warehouse in Newmarket, the other Markham store on Kirkham Dr. and the Colossus store in Vaughan round out the bottom 10.
Best to shop at
As Ontario’s highest-rated Costco warehouses, only four were in the GTA: Oshawa’s Findfields Farm store, which came in third place; the South Service Rd. location in Stoney Creek, which came in fourth; East York’s Overlea store; and the Queen Elizabeth Blvd. location in Etobicoke.
The No. 1 spot went to Orillia’s lone Costco warehouse, where staff were praised for being consistently friendly and pleasant.
In second place was the Nepean location on Strandherd Dr., which received special mention for its location and cleanliness.
The other top-rated Costcos in the province were the Kingsway location in Sudbury, Guelph’s only warehouse, Nepean’s other location on Merivale and the Waterloo store.
All 10 were commended for their smaller crowds, friendly staff and product selection.
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“Costco stocks much the same range in every warehouse, so the rating on Google comes down to the experience of getting in, getting around and getting out again,” Oliver Weston, founder of seobacklinks.com, said.
“The warehouses at the bottom of this list are among the most reviewed in the country, which usually means they’re the busiest, and reviewers there talk about packed parking lots, long lines at the tills and phones nobody picks up,” he noted.
“At the top, reviewers keep saying how much calmer their warehouse is than the big city ones,” he added.
“Every Costco in the ranking still averages more than four stars, so this is the difference between good and great. If you have a choice, it can be worth driving a little further to a quieter warehouse.”