International travel by Australians

IBISWorld forecasts international travel by Australians to increase by 5.1% in 2024-25, to 11.55 million departures. Australia's international travel has surpassed pre-pandemic levels, driven by the rapid return of flight capacity, heightened pent-up demand and pandemic-era savings. Key government policy initiatives, like digital visa processing, streamlined entry agreements with South-East Asia and targeted state subsidies for new airline routes, have directly reduced barriers and expanded destination access. Airline competition, particularly among low-cost carriers, has lowered fares and diversified route offerings. While leisure remains the dominant reason for travel, robust job creation and record-high participation have maintained the ability of people to travel despite real wages overall lagging inflation over the past five years. These combined factors continue to power historically high outbound travel volumes from Australia.

International departures plummeted over the two years through 2020-21, due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In monthly terms, international departures by Australians reached a low of 8,070 in August 2020, during Victoria's second wave of the pandemic. Seven months earlier, in January 2020, overseas trips by Australians totalled 1.4 million. Most of the Federal Government's heavy restrictions on outbound travel, which were implemented in March 2020, remained in effect during 2020-21 and much of 2021-22. However, the implementation of a trans-Tasman travel bubble during the June 2021 quarter resulted in a modest increase in international departures late in 2020-21. Australia's international border restrictions eased significantly in 2021-22. In November 2021, fully vaccinated Australian citizens and permanent residents were permitted to travel to and from Australia without an exemption. In February 2022, Australia's international borders were reopened to fully vaccinated tourists, leading to substantial growth in international departure numbers during the June 2022 quarter.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, international travel by Australians was growing strongly. Typically, nearly 60% of outbound trips are for holiday purposes and just over one-quarter of trips abroad are to visit friends and family. Rapid economic growth in Asia over the past decade has also had a positive effect on outbound travel as business opportunities in the region increased, with business trips generally contributing to just over 10% of total departures. Rising competition on international routes and a greater frequency of flights were also supporting outbound travel before the COVID-19 pandemic. Over the two years through 2018-19, low-cost carriers expanded their capacity to Australia as customers sought less costly fares to the most popular international destinations, like New Zealand, the US and Europe. Demand for flights to destinations within Asia, particularly Indonesia, China and Japan, also surged over the past decade. Overall, IBISWorld forecasts international travel by Australians to rise at a compound annual rate of 6.2% over the five years through 2024-25.