Melbourne shrank while Queensland grew: what the pandemic did to Australia’s population

Melbourne's population growth turned negative during the pandemic as people fled prolonged Covid lockdowns, while Queensland welcomed a steady stream of people moving from other states, new population data shows.

The data from the Centre for Population showed Melbourne's rate of population growth dropped from 1.8% in 2018-19 to -1.6% in 2020-21. Both international and interstate migration to Victoria fell, with annual population growth going backwards at -0.9%.

Melbourne residents spent 262 days in lockdown across the first two years of the pandemic, including one stretch of 111 days, contributing to the exodus from the state. People not only left Victoria and its capital, they stopped arriving from interstate as well, with net interstate migration not expected to return to pre-pandemic levels until 2023-24.

But demographers expect to see a rebound as Melbourne and Victoria see people return home. International students have led the population recovery, with net migration going from -53,000 in 2020-21 to 49,000 in 2021-22.

The next financial year is expected to see net overseas migration climb to 81,000, which should see Victoria's population grow by 1.1% by 2025-26.

Victoria's population hit 6.6 million in June 2021, which included 5 million people in greater Melbourne alone.

It's that concentration of residents which means Melbourne remains on track to overtake Sydney as Australia's most populous city, despite the pandemic's impact on population growth.

New South Wales's population was 8.1 million in June 2021 with 5.3 million people calling Sydney home.

Sydney will retain Australia's most populated city crown for another decade, but come 2031-32, Melbourne is predicted to take the throne with 6.0 million, pipping Sydney by a couple of hundred thousand people. The lead may only last a year, with forecasts predicting both cities will have a population of 6.1 million in 2032-33.

Queensland was less affected by the pandemic than other Australian states, because of continued interstate migration.

The sunshine state saw relatively strong population growth while most of the rest of the country saw drastic declines, growing by 0.8% in 2020-21 to a peak of 5.2 million people. Interstate migration is expected to underpin Queensland's population for years to come, with population growth forecast to recover to 1.7% in the next financial year, before slowing to 1.2% in 2032-33, by which point the state's population is forecast to hit 6.1 million.

Queensland also remains the nation's most decentralised state: in 2020-21 just 49% of the population lived in Brisbane.

Western Australia's population grew to 2.8 million by the end of June 2021 and is predicted to reach 3.2 million by 2032-33. Annual population growth remained stable at 1.1%.

But more overseas migrants are expected to move west, with the Centre for Population predicting the percentage of Australia's migrants moving to WA will increase from 6.6% to 10% over the next decade.

Migration, particularly international students, will drive South Australia's population increase. SA hit 1.8 million in June 2021 and should reach 2.0 million by 2032-33.

It's a similar story in the ACT, where the population is expected to grow from 454,000 to 550,000 over the next decade, with international students underpinning that growth.

Tasmania will also rely on overseas migration to grow its population from 568,000 to 647,000 by 2032-33, while the Northern Territory is expected to grow from 249,000 to 293,000 over the same period.

The full Centre for Population report will be released on Friday. The extracts released by the treasurer's office so far show an ageing population which will be smaller and slightly older than it otherwise would have been without the impact. The data helps outline the case for Australia to increase its migration levels, which is expected to be one of the recommendations of a coming review into Australia's migration system.