State Nomination Allocations by State and Territory for 2025-26
2025–26 allocations by jurisdiction
On 4 November 2025, the Australian Government set total state and territory nomination allocations for the 2025–26 program year at 20,350 new primary applicants. The Department of Home Affairs divided that allocation between the Skilled – Nominated visa, subclass 190, and the Skilled Work Regional (Provisional) visa, subclass 491.
| Jurisdiction | 2025–26 subclass 190 allocation | 2025–26 subclass 491 allocation |
|---|---|---|
| ACT | 800 | 800 |
| NSW | 2,100 | 1,500 |
| NT | 850 | 800 |
| QLD | 1,850 | 750 |
| SA | 1,350 | 900 |
| TAS | 1,200 | 650 |
| VIC | 2,700 | 700 |
| WA | 2,000 | 1,400 |
| Subtotal | 12,850 | 7,500 |
The combined 2025–26 allocation of 20,350 is therefore made up of 12,850 subclass 190 places and 7,500 subclass 491 places. These are nomination allocations, not figures for visas granted.
Source: Department of Home Affairs, State and territory nomination allocations.
What an allocation covers
Home Affairs publishes the annual allocation as the number of new primary applicants each state or territory can nominate in that program year. For the 2025–26 program year, this ceiling is split between two visa subclasses:
- Skilled – Nominated, subclass 190.
- Skilled Work Regional (Provisional), subclass 491.
A nomination is permission to make an application for one of those state and territory nominated visas. It is not the visa grant itself. The department’s Expression of Interest page also says an expression of interest is required before an applicant can be invited to apply for a subclass 190 or subclass 491 visa.
The allocation therefore sits upstream of the application and grant stages. It sets a limit on how many new primary applicants a jurisdiction may nominate during the program year; it does not state how many applications will be made, invited or granted.
An allocation is not a visa-grant count
The distinction is explicit in Home Affairs’ published definition:
Nomination allocations are the number of new primary applicants each state or territory can nominate in a program year. They do not determine the number of visas granted in the program year.
That means the 2025–26 total of 20,350 must not be read as a forecast or count of 20,350 visas granted. The same applies to the 2025–26 subclass 190 allocation of 12,850 and the 2025–26 subclass 491 allocation of 7,500.
Home Affairs says existing on-hand applications and new applications nominated by a state or territory are processed in line with permanent Migration Program planning levels and skilled visa processing priorities. Grant numbers are therefore governed through a different process from the annual allocation decision.
How the Australian Government sets the numbers
The Australian Government decides the annual state and territory nomination allocations. Home Affairs publishes three considerations behind that decision:
- the workforce and demographic needs of jurisdictions;
- the number of on-hand visa applications; and
- Migration Program planning levels.
The Permanent Migration Program planning levels page provides the department’s planning-level framework. Home Affairs separately states that it processes existing and newly nominated applications according to those planning levels and skilled visa processing priorities.
This is the federal quota-setting stage. It is separate from the next stage: the decision about which applicants a state or territory nominates under its own criteria.
Each jurisdiction applies its own criteria
Home Affairs states that states and territories assess applicants against criteria unique to their jurisdiction. The federal allocation table does not replace those local requirements.
The department links to each jurisdiction’s own nomination-requirements information, under these official titles: ACT – Migration, NSW – Visas and migration, VIC – Live in Melbourne, QLD – Business and Skilled Migration Queensland, NT – Migrate, WA – Skilled Migration Western Australia, SA – Move to South Australia, and TAS – Migration Tasmania. Those pages, not the federal table, are where a jurisdiction’s selection criteria are published.
Read against that framework, an allocation is a ceiling rather than an individual promise. It does not guarantee a nomination, an invitation to apply or a visa grant. The jurisdiction publishes and applies the selection criteria within its allocation.
The ACT Government’s Canberra Matrix is one example of a jurisdiction-specific selection mechanism. It operates at the ACT nomination stage and is distinct from the Australian Government’s decision about how many applicants each jurisdiction may nominate.
Allocations are reset for each program year
The allocation is not a permanent quota attached to a state or territory. Home Affairs says states and territories are provided with a nomination allocation each year, with the amount set for the relevant program year.
Confirmation can occur later in that sequence. The ACT Government’s migration page says the ACT’s 2026–27 allocation had not yet been confirmed by the Australian Government and that information would be published once confirmed. The same page separately states that the first 2026–27 invitation round was scheduled for the week starting 12 October 2026.
That example separates the two responsibilities: the Australian Government supplies the annual allocation figure, while the state or territory publishes and administers its own nomination and invitation process. The unconfirmed 2026–27 ACT allocation should not be inferred from the ACT’s 2025–26 allocations of 800 for subclass 190 and 800 for subclass 491.