The Air Canada Centre is a multi-purpose arena located on Bay Street in downtown Toronto, Ontario. It is the home of the Toronto Raptors of the National Basketball Association, the Toronto Maple Leafs of the National Hockey League, and the Toronto Rock of the National Lacrosse League. It was also home to the Toronto Phantoms of the Arena Football League during their brief existence. The arena is popularly known as "the ACC" or "the Hangar" (the latter nickname coming from its sponsorship by Canada's largest airline).

From its initial design to completion it revolutionized many concepts now included in new arenas and stadiums such as luxury suites accessible on the ground floor, splitting the main scoreboard into several sections, rotating all sponsor signage in the bowl at once (to allow dominant messaging), and multiple restaurants in and out of the main arena bowl view.

The arena is owned by Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment Ltd., the same group that owns both the Leafs and Raptors, and is 665,000 square feet (62,000 m²) in size. Air Canada Centre is connected to Union Station and the underground pedestrian PATH system, providing easy access to public transportation (TTC's Union subway station and GO Transit) for fans attending events. There are also 13,000 parking spaces within immediate walking distance.

Since opening, Air Canada Centre has been recognized with more than 25 industry awards that range from Canadian Major Facility of the Year (multiple times), the U.S. based Facilities & Event Management Magazine's Prime Site Award, the Wine Spectator, VQA Restaurant and the International (Diamond Wine Award) Awards of Excellence, and Tourism Toronto's Jeff Adams Access Award of Excellence for the facilities accessibility.

Air Canada Centre remains the only arena in North America to house three of its own exclusive award-winning restaurants -- The Platinum Club, Air Canada Club and Hot Stove Club. The restaurants, along with themed concessions stands and kiosks offer a diversity of food and beverages that capture Toronto's multicultural flavor. Two in-house bars, the Ice Box and Rickard's Brewhouse (which has its own micro-brewery) are favorite spots for fans before and during games.

The Air Canada Centre was started by the Toronto Raptors under its initial ownership group headed by Canadian businessman John Bitove. The building was designed for both hockey and basketball, but basketball was its foremost purpose; indeed, sight lines were designed to be especially good for basketball's smaller court. While the building was under construction, the Maple Leafs were also looking at building their own new arena at a different location. Journalists such as the Toronto Star's Dave Perkins encouraged both sides to pair up into one arena; two 20,000-seat arenas were seen as overkill for the city.

In purchasing the Raptors and the under-construction Air Canada Centre, MLSE provided the Maple Leafs the venue to move out of the aging legendary Maple Leaf Gardens. MLSE made some changes to the plans while the construction was underway, including turning upper level seats in the west end of the arena into private boxes. The Air Canada Centre's groundbreaking was performed in February of 1997.

The site was once occupied by the Canada Post Delivery Building. The current building retained the striking Art Deco facades of the east (along Bay Street) and south (Lake Shore Boulevard) walls of that structure, but the rest of the building (facing Union Station) was removed to make room for the arena.

The 15-storey tower on Bay Street stands at 55 metres, and provides connections in the atrium to Union Station, Bay Street, and York Street (via Bremner Boulevard).

In late 2005, Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment announced that they would be renovating the western side of the Air Canada Centre during the 2008 off-season, to connect it with the future Maple Leaf Square development. Maple Leaf Square is jointly owned by MLSE, Cadillac Fairview and Lantera Developments. The $500 million development will include two restaurants, Hotel Le Germain at Maple Leaf Square boutique hotel, extensive retail shopping including a 9,000 square foot Leafs, Raptors, and Toronto FC store, two 54-storey condominiums, a Longo's supermarket, a High-Definition broadcast studio, and a public square. It is slated for completion in 2009-10.