A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | CH | I | J | K | L | M | N | O | P | Q | R | S | T | U | V | W | X | Y | Z | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9
| Demographics of Australia | |
|---|---|
 Population pyramid of Australia in 2022 | |
| Population | 27,231,525 (as of May 2024) |
| Growth rate | 1.60% (2023 est.) |
| Birth rate | 12.3 births/1,000 population |
| Death rate | 6.77 deaths/1,000 population |
| Life expectancy | 83.09 years |
| • male | 80.93 years |
| • female | 85.36 years |
| Fertility rate | 1.63 children |
| Infant mortality rate | 3.01 deaths/1,000 live births |
| Net migration rate | 6.93 migrant(s)/1,000 population |
| Sex ratio | |
| Total | 0.99 male(s)/female (2022 est.) |
| At birth | 1.05 male(s)/female |
| Nationality | |
| Nationality | Australian |
| Major ethnic | |
| Minor ethnic |
|
| Language | |
| Official | English |
| Spoken | Languages of Australia |
The population of Australia is estimated to be 27,273,300 as of 30 June 2024.[9] Australia is the 56th[10] most populous country in the world and the most populous Oceanian country. Its population is concentrated mainly in urban areas, particularly on the Eastern, South Eastern and Southern seaboards, and is expected to exceed 30 million by 2029.[11]
Australia's population has grown from an estimated population of between 300,000 and 2,400,000 Indigenous Australians at the time of British colonisation in 1788 due to numerous waves of immigration during the period since. Also due to immigration, the European component's share of the population rose sharply in the late 18th and 19th centuries, but is now declining as a percentage.[12]
Australia has an average population density of 3.6 persons per square kilometre of total land area, which makes it one of the most sparsely populated countries in the world. This is generally attributed to the semi-arid and desert geography of much of the interior of the country. Another factor is urbanisation, with 89% of its population living in a handful of urban areas, Australia is one of the world's most urbanised countries.[13] The life expectancy of Australia in 2015–2017 was 83.2 years, among the highest in the world.[14]
Cities
Australia contains five cities (including their suburbs) that consist of over one million people. Most of Australia's population live close to coastlines.[15]
| Rank | Name | State | Pop. | Rank | Name | State | Pop. | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sydney | NSW | 5,259,764 | 11 | Geelong | Vic | 289,400 | ||
| 2 | Melbourne | Vic | 4,976,157 | 12 | Hobart | Tas | 251,047 | ||
| 3 | Brisbane | Qld | 2,568,927 | 13 | Townsville | Qld | 181,665 | ||
| 4 | Perth | WA | 2,192,229 | 14 | Cairns | Qld | 155,638 | ||
| 5 | Adelaide | SA | 1,402,393 | 15 | Darwin | NT | 148,801 | ||
| 6 | Gold Coast–Tweed Heads | Qld/NSW | 706,673 | 16 | Toowoomba | Qld | 143,994 | ||
| 7 | Newcastle–Maitland | NSW | 509,894 | 17 | Ballarat | Vic | 111,702 | ||
| 8 | Canberra–Queanbeyan | ACT/NSW | 482,250 | 18 | Bendigo | Vic | 102,899 | ||
| 9 | Sunshine Coast | Qld | 355,631 | 19 | Albury-Wodonga | NSW/Vic | 97,676 | ||
| 10 | Wollongong | NSW | 305,880 | 20 | Launceston | Tas | 93,332 | ||
Ancestry
The earliest accepted timeline for the first arrivals of humans to the continent of Australia places this human migration to at least 65,000 years ago,[17] most probably from the islands of Indonesia and New Guinea.[18]
Captain James Cook claimed the east coast for Great Britain in 1770; the west coast was later settled by Britain also. At that time, the indigenous population was estimated to have been between 315,000 and 750,000,[19] divided into as many as 500 tribes speaking many different languages.
Between 1788 and the Second World War, the vast majority of settlers and immigrants came from the British Isles (principally England, Ireland and Scotland), although there was significant immigration from China and Germany during the 19th century. In the decades immediately following the Second World War, Australia received a large wave of immigration from across Europe, with many more immigrants arriving from Southern and Eastern Europe than in previous decades. Since the end of the White Australia policy in 1973, Australia has pursued an official policy of multiculturalism,[20] and there has been a large and continuing wave of immigration from across the world, with Asia being the largest source of immigrants in the 21st century.[21]
The Australian Bureau of Statistics no longer collects data on race, but does ask each Australian resident to nominate up to two ancestries each census.[22] These ancestry responses are classified into broad standardised ancestry groups.[23] In the 2021 census, the most commonly nominated individual ancestries as a proportion of the total population were:[24]
At the 2021 census, 3.2% of the Australian population identified as being Indigenous — Aboriginal Australians and Torres Strait Islanders.[N 3][26] In 2020, 7.5% of births were Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander persons up from 5.7% in 2010; Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander fertility rates have stayed above replacement levels even as the nation's has declined rapidly.[27]
Although the ABS does not collect data on race and ethnic background, various studies have put together results of the census to determine the ethnic composition of Australia, the Australian Human Rights Commission has estimated the European population at 76% of the Australian population,[28] while a media diversity study put it at 72%, the non-European proportion was 21% and 23% respectively, and the Aboriginal Australian population at 3% in both.[29]
Immigration minister Andrew Giles had pledged to incorporate a question on ethnicity into the 2026 Australian census.[30] However in 2024 the ABS decided against collecting data on ethnicity.[31]
Immigration and country of birth
In 2019, 30% of the Australian resident population, or 7,529,570 people, were born overseas.[32]
Australia's population has quadrupled since the end of World War I,[33] much of this increase from immigration. Australia has the world's eighth-largest immigrant population, with immigrants accounting for 30% of the population, a higher proportion than in any other nation with a population of over 10 million.[32][34] Most immigrants are skilled,[35] but the immigration quota includes categories for family members and refugees.[35]
The following table shows Australia's population by country of birth as estimated by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2023. It shows only countries or regions or birth with a population of over 100,000 residing in Australia.
