21.1% ▲ +24.9%
Higher than 82% of remoteness area areas.
- 2011: 16.9%
- 2016: 20.3%
- 2021: 21.1%
Share of people who use a language other than English at home.
Major Cities of Australia · Remoteness Area
Language in Major Cities of Australia
The languages spoken in homes across the area, beyond English.
More than one in five people in the major cities of Australia speak a language other than English at home, making these areas far more linguistically diverse than most of the country. This reflects a growing trend, as the proportion of people using another language rose by 4.2 percentage points since 2011.
Languages at home
English and the largest community languages.
While 21.1% of people use a language other than English at home, this is a little below the national figure of 22.3%. English is the main language for 73.9%, followed by Mandarin at 2.4% and Italian at 1.1%, while 2.7% of people speak little or no English.
2.7% ▼ -9.6%
Higher than 80% of remoteness area areas.
- 2016: 2.9%
- 2021: 2.7%
Share of people who use another language at home and speak English not well or not at all. No 2011 figure — that census only asked proficiency of overseas-born residents.
Sources
- Census of Population and Housing — Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2021 (CC BY 4.0).
More for Major Cities of Australia
Cite this page
Australian Bureau of Statistics. (2021). Language in Major Cities of Australia [Census of Population and Housing]. CensusAtlas, used under CC BY 4.0. https://censusatlas.au/region/ra/RA50/major-cities-of-australia/topic/language