At the 2021 Australian census, 278,043 people in New South Wales were Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. New South Wales is Australia’s most populated state, also housing Australia’s largest city, Sydney. By comparison, Australia’s second largest state, Victoria, was home to around 66 thousand Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people.

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples

There are around 800,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia, which represents just over three percent of the Australian population. Indigenous people are often referred to as Australia's first people or the traditional custodians of the land in recognition of their ancestors inhabiting Australia more than 60,000 years ago. Australia's Indigenous peoples are represented by two distinct groups. Aboriginal people come from the Australian mainland. Torres Strait Islander people inhabit the group of Islands between the northern tip of Queensland and Papua New Guinea and represent less than 40,000 people.

Closing the gap

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples experience significantly poorer health and wellbeing outcomes when compared to their non-Indigenous Australian counterparts. The average life expectancy of Indigenous Australians is around eight years shorter than that of the non-Indigenous population. In education, Indigenous Australians are also underrepresented, but attendance rates are improving and in 2019, full-time Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students numbered well over 200,000 people.

The share of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population in Australia in 2019 was highest in New South Wales with around 33 percent of the indigenous population in Australia living there. Comparatively, the Australian Capital Territory accounted for only one percent of the country's indigenous population in that year.

This dataset presents the estimates of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, non-Indigenous and total populations of Australia for the year ending at 30 June 2016, based on results of the 2016 Census of Population and Housing. The data is by Local Government Areas (LGA) following the 2016 Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS). The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population of Australia comprises people who are of Aboriginal origin, Torres Strait Islander origin or both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander origin. The Commonwealth definition of an Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander person is: a person of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander descent who; identifies as being of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander origin and who is; accepted as such by the community with which the person associates. This data is Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data (catalogue number: 3238.0.55.001) used with permission from the ABS. For more information please visit the ABS Explanatory Notes. Please note: AURIN has spatially enabled the original data.

The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander resident population in Australia was forecasted to increase to close to 1.1 million by 2031, based on 2016 population estimates. The forecasted Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander resident population for 2023 was approximately 919 thousand people.

Indigenous Locations (ILOC)

Indigenous Locations (ILOCs) represent small Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities (urban and rural) that are near each other or that share language, traditional borders, or Native Title. Indigenous Locations (ILOCs) are geographic areas built from whole Statistical Areas Level 1 (SA1s).

ILOCs usually have a minimum population of about 90 usual residents. In some cases, they may have a smaller Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population to meet statistical requirements or to better represent the local community. ILOCs combine to form Indigenous Areas (IAREs).

Using ILOCs with Census data

Use ILOCs if you require very specific information about an area. Due to their small population size, there are limitations to the quality of data at this geography level.

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Australian Bureau of Statistics (Jul2021-Jun2026), Data services and APIs, ABS Website, accessed 25 July 2023.

https://www.abs.gov.au/website-privacy-copyright-and-disclaimer#copyright-and-creative-commons

This dataset presents information from G07 – Indigenous status by age by sex in Australia based on the general community profile from the 2021 Census. It contains characteristics of persons, families, and dwellings by Local Government Areas (LGA), 2021, from the Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) Edition 3.

This dataset is part of a set of web services based on the 2021 Census. It can be used as a tool for researching, planning, and analysis. The data is based on place of usual residence (that is, where people usually live, rather than where they were counted on Census night), unless otherwise stated.

Small random adjustments have been made to all cell values to protect the confidentiality of respondents. These adjustments may cause the sum of rows or columns to differ by small amounts from table totals. For further information see the 2021 Census Privacy Statement, Confidentiality, and Introduced random error/perturbation.

Made possible by the Digital Atlas of Australia The Digital Atlas of Australia is an Australian Government initiative being led by Geoscience Australia. It will bring together trusted datasets from across government in an interactive, secure, and easy-to-use geospatial platform. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) is working in partnership with Geoscience Australia to establish a set of web services to make ABS data available in the Digital Atlas.

Contact the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) If you have questions, feedback or would like to receive updates about this web service, please email geography@abs.gov.au. For information about how the ABS manages any personal information you provide view the ABS privacy policy.

Data and geography references Source data publication: G07 – Indigenous status by age by sex Geographic boundary information: Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS) Edition 3 Further information: About the Census, 2021 Census product release guide – Community Profiles, Understanding Census geography Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS)

This dataset presents the estimates of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, non-Indigenous and total populations of Australia for the year ending at 30 June 2016, based on results of the 2016 Census of Population and Housing. The data is by Statistical Area Level 2 (SA2) regions following the 2016 Australian Statistical Geography Standard (ASGS). The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population of Australia comprises people who are of Aboriginal origin, Torres Strait Islander origin or both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander origin. The Commonwealth definition of an Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander person is: a person of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander descent who; identifies as being of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander origin and who is; accepted as such by the community with which the person associates. This data is Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data (catalogue number: 3238.0.55.001) used with permission from the ABS. For more information please visit the ABS Explanatory Notes. Please note: AURIN has spatially enabled the original data.

In 2021, the proportion of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people living in major cities in Australia amounted to 41.1 percent of the Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander population. By comparison, 73.7 percent of the non-Indigenous population lived in major cities. Although the majority of the Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander population lived in major cities and inner regional areas, almost one in ten lived in very remote communities.

Macquarie Atlas of Indigenous Australia Dataset

This dataset documents food retail stores that service remote Indigenous communities in Australia. A seed list created by the National Indigenous Australians Agency (NIAA) was extended and validated, including reviews by experts and stakeholders, during 2022. Store location, contact information, management, and ownership/legal registration were identified along with the size of the community the store serves. A final dataset of 233 remote or very remote stores was created.

In 2021, 24.3 percent of First Nations people aged 20 to 64 living in the Australian Capital Territory of Australia had a Bachelor degree in Australia. The national average for all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders was 9.8 percent. Just four percent of First Nations people living in the Northern Territory had a bachelor degree as of 2021.

The average life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia is just one indicator of the gap in health outcomes that exists between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australians. From 2015 to 2017, the average life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island men and women in major cities in Australia was 72.1 and 76.5 years, respectively. By comparison, the non-Indigenous population lived around eight years longer on average. This divide is even more pronounced in rural and very remote areas where the life expectancy of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders drops to below 70 years.

Closing the gap

Over the past decade the federal, state and territory Governments of Australia have been working toward closing the gap of inequality experienced by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people with the Closing the Gap Framework, introduced in 2008. The Framework identified seven target areas for improving the health and wellbeing outcomes of Indigenous Australians. These target areas covered early childhood, schooling, health, economic participation, healthy homes, safe communities, and governance and leadership. In 2020, school enrollment rates were steadily increasing and more Indigenous Australians were attaining a bachelor degree. As a result, the schooling target was considered to be ‘on track’ along with early childhood education participation.

More work to be done

Although two of the seven targets were ‘on track’ in 2020, the other five Closing the Gap targets were not. This indicated that Australia still has a long way to go in order to significantly reduce the gap of disadvantage faced by indigenous Australians. This is evident in the proportion of Aboriginal Australians who remain unemployed or not in the labor force and Indigenous youth incarceration rates, which have been increasing.

Background: Population genomic studies of individuals of Indigenous ancestry have been extremely limited comprising

The number of Aboriginal people and their proportion of the total Aboriginal population for 5 year age groups to 65+, 2015. Aboriginal as used in this workbook refers to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people (all entries that were classified as not shown, not published or not applicable were assigned a null value; no data was provided for Maralinga Tjarutja LGA, in South Australia). The data is by LGA 2015 profile (based on the LGA 2011 geographic boundaries). For more information on Indigenous population estimates refer to: http://phidu.torrens.edu.au/. Source: Compiled by PHIDU based on data developed by Prometheus Information Pty Ltd, under a contract with the Australian Government Department of Health.

The number of people that identified as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander as a percentage of the total population by SD, 2011

In 2020 the child mortality rate of indigenous peoples in Australia under the age of five was 147.5 deaths per 100,000. By comparison, the non-Indigenous child mortality rate was less than half that of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in the country. In 2008 the Australian government made a commitment to achieving equality for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people through the Closing the Gap framework. One of the commitments made by this framework was to halve the Indigenous child mortality rate in the country over a decade from 2008. Although some progress was made, this target was not achieved.

According to the 2021 Census conducted in Australia, over 90 percent of the resident population in the country were non-Indigenous. Comparatively, just over three percent of the population identified as Indigenous, the majority of whom were Aboriginal.

Total population of persons identiying as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander, per SA1.

Population symbolised via 5 quantiles (each quantile contains one fifth of the total number of SA1s, and each quantile is represented by a unique colour).

Sourced from ABS Geopackage: CLDA (Cultural Language and Diversity) - provided via SA1 boundaries.

(c) Commonwealth of Australia, licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Australia licence. Based on Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data. ABS data used with permission from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (www.abs.gov.au)

(c) Commonwealth of Australia, licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 Australia licence. Based on Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data. ABS data used with permission from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (www.abs.gov.au)

Here we provide a catalogue of variants called after sequencing the exomes of 50 Aboriginal individuals from the Northern Territory (NT) of Australia and compare these to 72 previously published exomes from a Western Australian (WA) population of Martu origin. Sequence data for both NT and WA samples were processed using an ‘intersect-then-combine’ (ITC) approach, using GATK and SAMtools to call variants. The data is provided as 2 VCF files, one for the WA population and one for the NT population.

Whole exome sequencing (WES) is a popular and successful technology which is widely used in both research and clinical settings. However, there is a paucity of reference data for Aboriginal Australians to underpin the translation of health-based genomic research. Here we provide a catalogue of variants called after sequencing the exomes of 50 Aboriginal individuals from the Northern Territory (NT) of Australia and compare these to 72 previously published exomes from a Western Australian (WA) population of Martu origin. Sequence data for both NT and WA samples were processed using an ‘intersect-then-combine’ (ITC) approach, using GATK and SAMtools to call variants. A total of 289,829 variants were identified in at least one individual in the NT cohort and 248,374 variants in at least one individual in the WA cohort. Of these, 166,719 variants were present in both cohorts, whilst 123,110 variants were private to the NT cohort and 81,655 were private to the WA cohort. Our data set provides a useful reference point for genomic studies on Aboriginal Australians.