Moving to Australia for Work as an Indian: The Money-and-Logistics Guide to Visas, Super, Tax and What to Do With Your India Finances

A software engineer in Bengaluru takes a Sydney offer at AUD 130,000 and does the mental maths at the airport exchange rate: 130,000 times 55 is over Rs 71 lakh, so he is rich. Eighteen months later he is staring at a payslip where roughly 30% has gone to income tax and Medicare, Sydney rent has eaten AUD 2,500 a month, and the AUD 19,000 of "employer super" he assumed he could pocket on the way home turns out to be locked away, and taxed at 35% if he can take it at all. None of that was hidden. He just never ran the real numbers before he signed.

The 30-second answer: Indians move to Australia for work mainly on three routes: the points-tested subclass 189 (independent PR) and subclass 190 (state-nominated PR, plus 5 points), or the employer-sponsored subclass 482 Skills in Demand visa (temporary, Core Skills threshold around AUD 73,150, Specialist Skills around AUD 141,000). Employers must pay 12% superannuation on top of salary from 1 July 2025. As a tax resident you pay 16% to 45% income tax plus a 2% Medicare levy; foreign residents pay 30% from the first dollar and no Medicare. On leaving permanently, temporary-visa holders can reclaim super via DASP, taxed at 35%; PR holders cannot withdraw it. The India-Australia DTAA (1991) prevents double taxation and the Social Security Agreement (2016) prevents double pension contributions.

This guide is for the Indian professional who is weighing or has accepted an Australian role and wants the financial reality, not the brochure. It assumes you already understand NRE versus NRO accounts and your Indian residency status; if not, start with the moving abroad financial checklist. What follows is the part that actually moves money: which visa fits your situation, the superannuation trap that catches almost everyone, the take-home arithmetic in real AUD, what to do with your Indian accounts and assets, and the two treaties that decide whether you get taxed twice.

The three visa routes, and which one your situation actually points to

There is no single "work visa" for Australia. The route depends on whether you have an employer sponsor, how strong your points score is, and whether you want permanent residency from day one or are willing to start temporary.

The subclass 189 Skilled Independent visa is the cleanest outcome: permanent residency, no employer, no state tie, live and work anywhere. It is also the hardest to get. It is points-tested through an Expression of Interest in SkillSelect, and while the formal pass mark is 65 points, the real invitation cutoff for most occupations sits at 85 to 95 points because invitations go to the highest scorers first. Points come from age (maximum 30, and you only keep all 30 while you are under 33), English (maximum 20 for "superior", which means roughly IELTS 8 across all bands), skilled work experience (maximum 20), and qualifications (maximum 20). The hard truth for a 35-year-old Indian applicant: age alone has already cost you points, so you need superior English and a strong experience record to stay competitive. Your occupation must be on the relevant skilled list, and you must pass a skills assessment by the assessing authority for your occupation (ACS for most IT roles, Engineers Australia for engineers, and so on).

The subclass 190 State or Territory Nominated visa is the same permanent outcome with one lever: a state or territory nominates you and adds 5 points to your score, often the difference between sitting in the EOI pool forever and getting invited. The price is a commitment to live and work in the nominating state, typically for two to three years. For an applicant stuck at 85 points, a 190 nomination from a state that wants your occupation is frequently the most realistic path to PR.

The subclass 482 Skills in Demand visa is the employer-sponsored route, and for most Indians who already have an offer in hand, it is the one they will actually use. It replaced the old Temporary Skill Shortage (subclass 482) streams in December 2024 and now runs in three tiers defined by salary. The Specialist Skills stream is for high earners, with a threshold around AUD 141,000, and offers faster processing and an easier road to permanent residency. The Core Skills stream covers the bulk of sponsored workers, with a salary threshold around AUD 73,150 (formally the Core Skills Income Threshold) and the occupation on the Core Skills Occupation List. There is also an Essential Skills tier for lower-paid occupations under labour-agreement arrangements. The 482 is temporary, but after working for an eligible employer it can lead to permanent residency through the subclass 186 Employer Nomination Scheme. The critical financial point that catches people: the 482 is a temporary visa, and that single fact is what later lets you reclaim your super through DASP, whereas a PR holder cannot.

There is a fourth route worth a line: the subclass 491 Skilled Work Regional (Provisional) visa, which gives extra points for committing to a regional area, requires you to meet an income threshold (around AUD 53,900 a year) during the qualifying period, and converts to permanent residency via the subclass 191 after three years. If your points are short and you are open to a regional city, the 491 is a genuine back door to PR that metro-focused applicants overlook.

The decision in one line: if you have an offer, you are almost certainly on a 482 and should optimise for converting it to PR; if you do not have an offer and your points are strong, chase 189; if your points are 5 short, a 190 nomination is your lever; and if they are more than 5 short, look hard at 491.

Superannuation: the 12% you might not get to keep

This is the single most misunderstood number for Indians moving to Australia, so spend a minute on it. Superannuation is Australia's compulsory retirement system. Your employer must pay the Superannuation Guarantee, which from 1 July 2025 is 12% of your ordinary time earnings, into a super fund on top of your salary, not deducted from it. On an AUD 120,000 base, that is roughly AUD 14,400 a year going into a fund in your name. It compounds, the earnings inside are taxed at a concessional 15%, and it is genuinely yours.

The catch is access. Super is "preserved", meaning you generally cannot touch it until you reach preservation age (60 for anyone born after June 1964) and retire. For an Indian who plans to spend a few years in Australia and go home, that locks away a large sum for decades. Which brings in the exit door almost nobody understands until they need it.

The Departing Australia Superannuation Payment, the DASP, lets you withdraw your entire super balance, but only if two things are true: you held a temporary visa (the 482 qualifies; permanent residents do not), and that visa has expired or been cancelled and you have left Australia. You apply free through the ATO's online DASP system after departure. So far so good. Then the tax lands.

DASP is taxed at source, and the rate is brutal: the taxed element of the taxable component is withheld at 35% for most skilled and temporary visa holders (a far higher 65% applies to working holiday makers, the subclass 417 and 462 backpacker visas, which most professionals will not be on). Put real numbers on it. Say you worked in Sydney for three years on a 482 and your fund accumulated AUD 45,000, almost all of it taxable component. When you claim DASP you receive roughly AUD 45,000 minus 35%, or about AUD 29,250, and the ATO keeps AUD 15,750. That is the price of pulling forced retirement savings out of the country early.

Here is the counterfactual that changes the decision for many people. Suppose instead you stay long enough to become a permanent resident (189, 190, or 191 after a 491). The instant you are a PR, DASP is no longer available to you at all, because DASP is only for people who held a temporary visa. Your AUD 45,000 stays preserved in Australia, untouched, growing at concessional 15% tax on earnings, until you reach 60. If you later return to India for good as an Australian PR or citizen, you can usually access it at preservation age as an Australian retiree and bring it home then. So the honest framing is: the 482 holder who leaves gets the money now but loses 35%; the PR who leaves keeps every dollar but cannot see it for years. Neither is strictly better, but the 35% haircut is real cash, and you should factor it into the "is this move worth it" calculation rather than treating super as a bonus you will simply pocket on the way home.

One more layer that applies to a specific group. If your Indian employer seconds you to Australia temporarily rather than you taking a local hire, the India-Australia Social Security Agreement (covered below) can let you stay on the Indian Provident Fund system and exempt your employer from paying Australian super at all, via a certificate of coverage. In that case there is no Australian super to reclaim because none was paid, and your India EPF keeps running. Check which structure your offer uses, because it changes everything about super.

Income tax and the Medicare levy: the real take-home

Whether you are taxed as a resident or a foreign resident matters more than almost anything else on your payslip, and it is decided by your circumstances, not your visa label. Broadly, if you are in Australia on a 482, 189 or 190, living and working there with the intention of staying for the medium term, you will be a tax resident and taxed on your worldwide income at resident rates, with the benefit of the tax-free threshold.

For 2025-26, the resident brackets are: nil on the first AUD 18,200; 16% from AUD 18,201 to AUD 45,000; 30% from AUD 45,001 to AUD 135,000; 37% from AUD 135,001 to AUD 190,000; and 45% above AUD 190,000. On top sits the Medicare levy of 2% of taxable income, which funds the public health system and is paid by most residents (a low-income phase-in starts around AUD 27,222 and the full 2% applies above roughly AUD 34,000). From 1 July 2026 the legislated "Stage 3 plus" cuts take the 16% rate down to 15% and the 30% rate down to 29%, with a further cut to 14% and 28% a year after, so a 2026-27 payslip is marginally lighter than a 2025-26 one.

Foreign residents are taxed very differently and almost always worse on the same income: no tax-free threshold, 30% from the first dollar up to AUD 135,000, then 37% and 45% on the same upper bands, and no Medicare levy. A non-resident on AUD 80,000 pays 30% from dollar one, where a resident pays nothing on the first AUD 18,200 and 16% on the next slice. For the typical Indian professional who relocates and lives in Australia, resident status is both the reality and the cheaper outcome.

Put real numbers on a common case. Priya takes a Melbourne role at a base salary of AUD 120,000 and is an Australian tax resident for the full 2025-26 year. Her income tax is nil on the first AUD 18,200; 16% of the AUD 26,800 to AUD 45,000 (AUD 4,288); 30% of the AUD 75,000 from AUD 45,001 to AUD 120,000 (AUD 22,500); for a total income tax of about AUD 26,788. Add the 2% Medicare levy on AUD 120,000, roughly AUD 2,400, and her total deduction is about AUD 29,188, leaving take-home of about AUD 90,812 a year, or roughly AUD 7,568 a month. Separately, her employer pays 12% super, about AUD 14,400, into her fund on top, so her true total package is closer to AUD 134,400, but only the AUD 90,812 hits her bank account.

Now the counterfactual that shows why the resident-versus-foreign question matters. Had Priya somehow been taxed as a foreign resident on the same AUD 120,000, she would pay 30% on the first AUD 135,000 of income with no tax-free threshold, so 30% of AUD 120,000 is AUD 36,000, with no Medicare levy. Her take-home would be AUD 84,000, about AUD 6,800 less than as a resident, despite paying no Medicare. The resident rates plus the levy still beat foreign-resident rates for anyone earning under roughly AUD 135,000, which is why establishing genuine residency promptly is worth doing.

Item (2025-26, AUD)	Resident on 120,000	Foreign resident on 120,000
Tax-free threshold	18,200	0
Income tax	26,788	36,000
Medicare levy (2%)	2,400	0
Total deductions	29,188	36,000
Take-home (cash)	90,812	84,000
Employer super on top (12%)	14,400	14,400

Two further numbers to keep in view. If you arrive with an outstanding Australian study loan you will also see a HELP repayment, but that does not apply to most Indian hires. And the Medicare levy buys you the public system, but as a temporary 482 holder you are generally not eligible for Medicare unless your country has a reciprocal health-care agreement, and India does not. That is an awkward spot: you may pay the levy as a resident yet need private health insurance to satisfy your visa condition (482 holders must hold adequate health cover). Budget roughly AUD 1,500 to AUD 2,500 a year for a single person's private cover, and apply for a Medicare levy exemption when you file if you genuinely had no access to Medicare for the year, which many 482 holders can claim back.

What it actually costs to live there

The salary only matters net of what the city takes. Australia's two biggest job markets, Sydney and Melbourne, are also its two most expensive, and Sydney is meaningfully dearer than Melbourne.

In Sydney, a one-bedroom apartment in or near the city centre runs around AUD 2,500 a month, with inner suburbs like Surry Hills or Newtown at AUD 2,200 to AUD 2,800 and outer suburbs like Parramatta dropping to AUD 1,400 to AUD 1,800. Beyond rent, a single person spends roughly AUD 1,300 a month on everything else: groceries, transport, utilities, phone, the occasional meal out. In Melbourne, the same one-bedroom is roughly AUD 1,800 to AUD 2,400 in the inner suburbs and AUD 1,400 to AUD 1,700 further out, with non-rent living costs for a single person around AUD 1,700 a month. Rent in Melbourne runs roughly 29% below Sydney, which over a year is the difference between two return flights to India.

Put that against Priya's Melbourne take-home of about AUD 7,568 a month. If she pays AUD 2,200 rent for a decent inner-suburb one-bedroom and spends AUD 1,700 on everything else, she clears roughly AUD 3,668 a month, around AUD 44,000 a year, that she can save, invest, or remit to India. The same person in Sydney on the same salary, paying AUD 2,600 rent, saves closer to AUD 3,300 a month. This is the number that actually answers "is the move worth it", not the gross salary. At an indicative rate of about Rs 55 to the AUD in mid-2026, AUD 44,000 of annual savings is roughly Rs 24 lakh a year of remittable surplus, which is the figure to compare against what you could save on an Indian salary, not the headline AUD 120,000.

Setting up banking before and after you land

You cannot get paid, rent a flat, or be taken seriously without an Australian bank account, and the system is friendlier to newcomers than India's is to NRIs. The four majors are Commonwealth Bank (CBA), Westpac, ANZ and NAB, and all four let you open an account from overseas before you arrive, often up to 12 months ahead, using your passport and visa details. CBA's and NAB's migrant accounts are the most commonly used by new arrivals. You open online, the account waits for you, and you simply walk into a branch with your passport within a set window to verify your identity and activate it.

Do this before you fly. Having an active account number lets you give it to your employer for payroll and to a landlord for a rental bond, both of which you need in your first week. You will also need a Tax File Number (TFN), Australia's equivalent of a PAN, applied for through the ATO once you have a visa and an Australian address; without a TFN your employer must withhold tax at the top marginal rate, so apply on day one. To send your initial funds across, do not use your Australian bank's wire or an airport exchange; a specialist transfer service (Wise, or the bank's partner) will cost you a fraction of the spread.

Australian banking has no NRE/NRO complexity because you are simply a resident there. The complexity is all on the India side, which is the next section, and the credit-history reset, which is real: your Indian CIBIL score does not travel, so you start from zero in Australia. Building an Australian credit file from scratch matters if you ever want a car loan or mortgage there, and the playbook is the same as anywhere; see building credit history abroad.

The day you leave India, your accounts change

The moment you qualify as a non-resident under Indian tax law, your Indian financial life must be reorganised, and ignoring this is the most common compliance failure among new movers. Under FEMA, once you are an NRI you cannot keep ordinary resident savings accounts. Your existing accounts must be re-designated as NRO (for India-sourced income such as rent, dividends and interest) and you should open an NRE account (for money you remit from Australia, which stays fully repatriable and earns tax-free interest in India). Tell your banks before you go, or at least immediately after; the conversion is a form and a KYC update, not a hardship, but operating a resident account as an NRI is a breach.

Your Indian residency status for tax also shifts. In the year you leave, and possibly the year after, you may be Resident but Not Ordinarily Resident (RNOR), a transitional status that shields most foreign income from Indian tax for a year or two. After that you are a non-resident and India taxes you only on India-sourced income. The mechanics of when each status applies are in the residency guide on the taxation hub; the practical point for a mover is that RNOR is a window worth using to repatriate or restructure before full non-resident rules bite.

What you actually do with the India assets:

• EPF and PPF. Your EPF stops receiving contributions once you leave that employment, but the balance keeps earning interest; you can withdraw it. A PPF account can be run to maturity but cannot be extended once you are an NRI, and no fresh NRI PPF accounts can be opened.
• Mutual funds and stocks. You can keep them, but your demat and folios must be updated to NRI status (linked to an NRO account), and some fund houses restrict US and Canada residents; Australia is generally fine. Capital gains on Indian shares and funds remain taxable in India even as an NRI, at the rates in the capital gains guide for NRIs.
• Property and rent. Rent from an Indian flat is India-sourced, taxable in India, and your tenant must deduct TDS. That same rent is then also reportable in Australia once you are a resident there, with a foreign income tax credit for the Indian tax, which is exactly what the DTAA exists to handle.

The two treaties that decide whether you are taxed twice

Two separate India-Australia agreements protect you, and people routinely confuse them.

The Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement (DTAA), in force since 1991, deals with income tax. Once you are an Australian tax resident, Australia taxes your worldwide income, including your Indian rent, interest and gains. India still taxes the India-sourced portion. The DTAA stops you paying the full rate twice by giving you a foreign income tax credit in Australia for the Indian tax you paid, so you effectively pay the higher of the two rates, not the sum. In practice, since Australian marginal rates are often higher than the Indian rate on, say, interest, you pay the Indian tax and then top up to the Australian rate on that income. Keep clean records of Indian TDS and tax paid, because the credit is only as good as your documentation. The deeper mechanics of credits and the foreign-income reporting sit in the taxation guides; the social security and totalisation agreements guide covers the pension side in detail.

The Social Security Agreement (SSA), in force since 1 January 2016, deals with retirement contributions, not income tax, and this is the one that interacts with super. Its core function is to stop double social security liability for seconded workers. If your Indian employer seconds you to Australia temporarily, a certificate of coverage lets you remain on the Indian EPF system and exempts your Australian employer from paying the 12% Superannuation Guarantee on you. Reciprocally, Australians seconded to India are exempt from Indian Provident Fund contributions. A separate but related benefit: Indians who worked in Australia and Australians who worked in India can, in defined circumstances, claim back contributions they would otherwise lose. The SSA matters most if you are a secondee rather than a local hire; if you are hired directly by an Australian company, the SSA does not change your super, and the DASP route above is what governs your money.

Two more bits of bilateral context that frame the move. The India-Australia Economic Cooperation and Trade Agreement (ECTA), in force since 29 December 2022, is a goods-and-services trade deal, not a migration deal; it does not give Indians special visa access, though it has expanded business mobility and the broader economic relationship that drives demand for skilled Indians. And from January 2026, ECTA tariff reductions have deepened, which matters to traders and exporters but not directly to your payslip. Do not let a recruiter sell ECTA as a visa shortcut; it is not.

Edge cases

You arrive partway through the financial year. Australia's tax year runs 1 July to 30 June, not the calendar year and not India's April-March year. If you land in, say, October, you are a resident for only part of the year, and your tax-free threshold is pro-rated, which can produce a larger-than-expected bill or refund at your first return. File through myTax once you have your TFN and income statement.

You become a PR and later want your super early anyway. You cannot. The moment you hold permanent residency, DASP is off the table forever, even if you later leave Australia. The only people who can DASP are those who held a temporary visa and never converted. If extracting super early is important to you, that is a reason to think twice before jumping from 482 to PR purely for convenience.

Working holiday makers and the 65% trap. If you come on a subclass 417 or 462 working holiday visa rather than a skilled visa, your DASP taxed component is withheld at 65%, not 35%. Almost no skilled professional should be on a working holiday visa, but people sometimes start there; if you do, understand that your super is far less recoverable.

Your India rent and the Australian return. New movers often declare Indian rent in India, pay the TDS, and then forget it exists for Australian purposes. As an Australian resident you must report that rent on your Australian return too, claiming the DTAA credit for Indian tax. Omitting foreign income is the most common ATO trigger for migrants, and the data-sharing between tax authorities is now extensive.

The currency timing on your first big remittance. Moving your India savings to Australia (or vice versa) at the wrong moment can cost more than your tax planning saves. The INR-AUD rate moves enough that a few weeks' timing on a Rs 30 lakh transfer is real money; do not transact at an airport or through a bank's retail wire spread.

The closing read

The honest read is that Australia is a genuinely good financial move for a skilled Indian, but it is not the windfall the gross salary suggests, and two specific things will quietly cost you if you sleepwalk into them: the super you assume you will pocket, and the resident-versus-foreign tax question. So for the common case, an Indian taking a direct Australian job offer: you will be on a 482 Skills in Demand visa, taxed as a resident at 16% to 45% plus the 2% Medicare levy, with 12% super paid on top that you can later reclaim through DASP at a 35% haircut, or keep preserved if you go for permanent residency. Run your decision on the net number, the roughly AUD 90,000 take-home on a AUD 120,000 salary minus your city's rent, not on the headline. Re-designate your Indian accounts to NRO and NRE before you breach FEMA, use the RNOR window if you get one, and report your Indian income on both returns with the DTAA credit so you never pay twice. The one group for whom the calculus is different is secondees: if your Indian employer is posting you temporarily, get a certificate of coverage under the Social Security Agreement, stay on Indian EPF, and skip Australian super entirely. If your move involves a large property sale in India, an inheritance, or a genuinely complex residency-year split, that is the point to pay a cross-border tax adviser, not to rely on a guide, this one included.

Related guides

• The moving abroad financial checklist
• Cost of living compared: US, UK, UAE and India
• Social security and totalisation agreements explained
• Building a credit history abroad from scratch
• Canada Express Entry for Indians
• Capital gains tax for NRIs on Indian shares and mutual funds
• All Jobs and careers guides
• All Visa and migration guides
• All Taxation guides

This guide is educational and general in nature. It is not individual tax, migration or financial advice. Australian visa rules, salary thresholds, tax brackets, the super rate and DASP tax rates change frequently, and several figures here are scheduled to change on 1 July 2026, so confirm the current position with the Department of Home Affairs, the ATO and a qualified cross-border adviser before you act on any number.