persons per year - Source frequency: annual · Methodology · Corrections
Australia's net long-term and permanent arrivals was 491k persons per year as of April 2026. Net arrivals of permanent and long-term temporary visa holders over the 12 months to April each year, based on border crossing records. Unlike Net Overseas Migration (which uses the 12/16-month residency rule), this metric captures permanent settlement intent at the point of entry. It is a leading indicator for housing demand, school enrolments, and community services, as permanent arrivals require durable housing and infrastructure from day one. Data is sourced from ABS Overseas Arrivals and Departures (Cat. 3401.0), monthly permanent and long-term arrivals less departures (series A85232568L and A85232558J), summed over the 12 months to April. A border-crossing count: the ABS advises it should not be used as a measure of overseas migration (see Net Overseas Migration). and updated annually.
Net arrivals of permanent and long-term temporary visa holders over the 12 months to April each year, based on border crossing records.
Unlike Net Overseas Migration (which uses the 12/16-month residency rule), this metric captures permanent settlement intent at the point of entry. It is a leading indicator for housing demand, school enrolments, and community services, as permanent arrivals require durable housing and infrastructure from day one.
Context-dependent
This data is sourced programmatically from official statistical APIs and data feeds (ABS Overseas Arrivals and Departures (Cat. 3401.0), monthly permanent and long-term arrivals less departures (series A85232568L and A85232558J), summed over the 12 months to April. A border-crossing count: the ABS advises it should not be used as a measure of overseas migration (see Net Overseas Migration).), updated annually. The source link above points to the human-readable publication page, which presents the same underlying data in a different format (e.g. Excel workbook, PDF release). Our pipeline fetches the machine-readable version automatically and converts it to the standardised format shown here.
See all sources and methodology on the data sources page.
