Australia Announces New Rules Affecting Visas for Working Holiday
- Australian Minister Tony Burke unveiled new migration rules on September 17, 2026, affecting Working Holiday visa holders
- The lottery will cap second-year Working Holiday places at 45,000, down from about 57,000 who qualified the previous year
- A separate change will also apply a No Further Stay condition to Visitor visas as part of the broader reform package
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Australia is set to overhaul how it manages temporary migration, with new rules announced by Minister for Home Affairs and Immigration Tony Burke on September 17, 2026, that will affect hundreds of thousands of travellers each year.
The centrepiece of the announcement is a plan to replace automatic access to second and third Working Holiday Maker visas with a lottery system, limiting how many successful applicants can extend their time in the country.
Source: Getty Images
The government also confirmed that Visitor visas will have a "No Further Stay" condition applied as a standard feature, preventing visitors from switching to other visa types while in Australia.
Working holiday lottery: What changes
Under the current system, holders of the Working Holiday (subclass 417) and Work and Holiday (subclass 462) visas can qualify for a second year by completing 88 days of eligible work and a third year by completing six months of specific work. Meeting those conditions currently guarantees access to the next visa.
Under the proposed changes, completing the work requirements would make a person eligible to enter a draw, but would no longer guarantee a visa.
For the second year, the government intends to cap places at 45,000. Burke noted that roughly 57,000 people met the qualifying conditions in the previous year. The third-year quota is significantly tighter, set at 5,000 places against around 31,000 eligible candidates.
Burke was direct about the reasoning at the National Press Club on September 17: "Not everyone will get through, because we need to be able to exercise some control and have some visibility over these volumes."
The 88-day work requirement for a second visa and the six-month requirement for a third will both remain in place. Completing them will be a condition of entering the lottery, not a guarantee of a place in it.
The Department of Home Affairs said that these broader reforms have begun rolling out and will continue to be implemented over the next twelve months. However, the lottery component specifically requires a legislative change that has not yet passed, meaning it is not currently in effect. Details on registration windows and the selection process have not been published.
Who is Affected
French nationals holding subclass 417 visas, who are eligible up to age 35, would be directly affected by the lottery system once it becomes law.
British passport holders occupy a different position. Since July 1, 2024, under the Australia-United Kingdom free trade agreement, British nationals can access up to three Working Holiday visas without completing the specific regional work periods. Burke acknowledged this exception during the September 17 presentation, though the government has not yet clarified how the new quota arrangements will interact with the provisions granted to British applicants.
The lottery announcement follows a price increase that took effect on July 1, 2026, which raised the cost of a first Working Holiday visa application to 840 Australian dollars. Second and third subclass 417 visas are currently listed at 1,000 AUD by the Department of Home Affairs.
Source: Getty Images
70 countries exempted from Australian transit visa
Legit.ng earlier reported that the policy, known as Transit Without Visa (TWOV), allows eligible travellers to pass through Australia on their way to a third country without applying for an Australian visa, provided they meet a defined set of requirements.
Source: Legit.ng
