Partner visa numbers are published by the Department of Home Affairs, not by this site, and they change every program year. This page explains what the Migration Program planning levels are, where the partner category sits inside them, where the published numbers live, and what the words used in those tables actually mean. It deliberately does not reproduce figures that cannot be checked against a government page on the day of writing, because a stale number on a website is worse than no number at all.
What are the Migration Program planning levels?
The permanent Migration Program is planned a year at a time. Before each program year — which runs from 1 July to 30 June, the same as the financial year — the Australian Government settles how many places the program will have and how those places are distributed. Those allocations are the planning levels. They are published by the Department, and they are the figures people mean when they say the program is "x places this year".
The program is planned in broad groupings rather than one subclass at a time. Skilled migration is planned separately from family migration, and the partner category sits within the family part of the program alongside other family categories such as parent and child. Within the partner category are the onshore pair — the temporary subclass 820 and the permanent subclass 801 — and the offshore pair, subclasses 309 and 100. When a published table says "Partner", check whether it is counting all four subclasses or only some of them. A planning level is a planning figure, not by itself a legal ceiling on grants.
Are partner visas capped or demand-driven?
The legal machinery for capping sits in the Migration Act 1958. Section 85 lets the Minister determine, by legislative instrument, the maximum number of visas of a specified class that may be granted in a specified financial year. Section 86 gives that determination its effect: once the number of visas granted in the year reaches the maximum, no more visas of that class may be granted in the year. Sections 88 to 91 deal with the consequences — a cap does not stop the Department processing applications, and does not count as a failure to decide.
Section 87 is the provision that matters for partner applicants. It says that section 86 does not prevent the grant of a visa to a person who applied for it on the ground that they are the spouse, de facto partner or dependent child of an Australian citizen, of the holder of a permanent visa that is in effect, or of a person usually resident in Australia whose continued presence is not subject to a limitation as to time imposed by law. In other words, even where a cap has been determined, it cannot be used to stop partner grants.
That is the difference between a capped category, where grants stop when the number is reached, and a demand-driven category, where the published planning figure estimates how many visas will be granted rather than acting as a gate that closes. Whether a determination under section 85 has been made for a visa class in a financial year is checkable: determinations are legislative instruments, registered on the Federal Register of Legislation and searchable by title.
Where are the numbers published?
Four places are worth knowing, and they answer different questions.
- The Department's research and statistics section. The starting point for visa program data. Statistical releases carry the date they cover — read it before quoting anything.
- The Department's reporting on the Migration Program. The outcome for a program year is reported after the year ends, so the most recent published outcome is usually for the year before the one you are in.
- The visa processing time guide tool. The Department says it shows recently decided applications and is a guide only, not specific to your application. It answers "how long has it been taking", which is a different question from "how many were granted".
- The Australian Bureau of Statistics. Useful for migration to Australia generally — overseas migration, population and country of birth — and not a source for visa grants by subclass.
What do "lodged", "granted" and "on hand" mean?
These three words look interchangeable and are not.
Lodged counts valid applications made in a period. It says how much new work arrived, and nothing about how those applications were decided. A lodgement in June and one in July fall in different program years even though they are three weeks apart.
Granted counts visas granted in a period. Most of those grants belong to applications lodged in earlier years, so a grant figure for a year is not the outcome of the lodgements for that year. On the onshore partner pathway this is compounded: one application produces a subclass 820 grant and then, later, a subclass 801 grant. A table of "partner visa grants" may be counting both stages, or only the permanent stage, or only primary applicants and not the children included with them.
On hand is a snapshot at a date: applications received and not yet finally decided. It is the pipeline. A rising on hand figure can mean lodgements have gone up, or decisions have slowed, or both, and the number alone does not distinguish them.
Watch out
Before quoting any of these figures, check three things — the period it covers, whether it counts applications or people, and whether it covers all four partner subclasses or only some. Two published numbers that look contradictory are usually measuring different things.
Why a backlog figure is not a processing time
A backlog tells you how many applications are waiting. A processing time tells you how long applications that were recently decided had been waiting. Dividing one by the other does not produce your waiting time, for three reasons.
First, order is not purely by lodgement date. The Department processes family visa applications according to Ministerial Direction 117, so priority categories affect who is reached and when. Second, applications are not interchangeable. A complete, well-evidenced file and a thin one with unanswered requests for information sit in the same queue but do not move at the same speed. Third, the published processing times are themselves a lagging measure of applications already decided, which is why the Department describes the tool as a guide only and warns that applicants may experience longer processing times than expected.
The practical version of this is on 820 visa processing time, and the timing of the permanent stage — which the Department says starts from the date of eligibility, two years after the combined application was lodged — is on when the 801 is assessed.
Why this page publishes no figures
Every number on this site has to be traceable to a government source that can be opened and read. Partner visa statistics move each program year, and the Department's statistics pages could not be retrieved when this page was prepared on 23 September 2026. Rather than repeat a figure from memory or from a secondary site, this page sends you to the source for the program year you actually care about.
That is also the honest answer to the question behind the search. Program-level numbers say nothing about your own application, and no published figure changes whether the Department is satisfied that your relationship is genuine and continuing.
An application prepared by an Australian migration lawyer is more likely to succeed, and the trap this page points at is a real one: people delay lodging while they wait for a "better year" in the program, and in the meantime their substantive visa expires, which drags them into the Schedule 3 criteria and a much harder application. Someone who works with these files knows what the current settings actually mean for a lodgement decision. No one can promise an outcome.
What to do next
If you came here looking for how long it takes, go to 820 visa processing time and then processing time updates. If you came looking for what it costs and how that has moved, go to partner visa fee history. For the statutory background — the Act, the Regulations and the policy that sit underneath all of this — start at the law behind the partner visa, and use the partner visa glossary for any term on this page you have not met before.
Common questions
How many partner visas are granted each year in Australia?
The Department of Home Affairs publishes partner visa grant numbers on its research and statistics pages and in its reporting on the Migration Program, and the figure changes every program year. This page does not repeat a number it cannot verify on a government page at the time of writing. Check the Department's research and statistics section for the current program year rather than relying on a figure quoted on a website or in a news article.
Is there a cap on partner visas?
Section 85 of the Migration Act 1958 lets the Minister determine the maximum number of visas of a class that may be granted in a financial year, and section 86 stops further grants once that maximum is reached. Section 87 then says that the limit does not prevent the grant of a visa to a person who applied on the ground that they are the spouse, de facto partner or dependent child of an Australian citizen, the holder of a permanent visa, or a person usually resident in Australia without a time limitation. Determinations made under section 85 are legislative instruments, so you can check the Federal Register of Legislation to see whether one has been made for a class in a given year.
What does on hand mean in visa statistics?
On hand usually means the number of applications that have been received and not yet finally decided at a particular date. It is a snapshot of the pipeline, not a count of applications lodged in that year and not a count of decisions made. An on hand figure tells you how many files are waiting, but it does not tell you how long any individual application will take.
Does a big partner visa backlog mean my application will take longer?
Not necessarily, and a backlog figure cannot be converted into a waiting time for one application. The Department processes family visa applications according to Ministerial Direction 117, so order depends on priority categories as well as lodgement date, and each application also depends on whether its evidence is complete. The Department's visa processing time guide tool, which shows recently decided applications, is closer to an answer than any backlog number.
Where does the Australian Bureau of Statistics fit in?
The Australian Bureau of Statistics publishes migration data for Australia generally, including overseas migration and population statistics. It is not the place to look for counts of partner visa applications or grants by subclass. Those come from the Department of Home Affairs, which administers the visa program and publishes the program figures.
Sources
Keep reading
Spouse and De Facto Partner: The Legal Definitions
The exact wording of section 5F and section 5CB of the Migration Act 1958, regulations 1.15A and 1.09A and their four matters, and regulation 2.03A on the 12-month rule.
Read the guide →
The Migration Regulations for Subclass 820, Explained
A clause-by-clause guide to subclass 820 in the Migration Regulations 1994 — Schedule 1 item 1214C, Part 820 of Schedule 2, and Part 801 in brief.
Read the guide →
How Home Affairs Policy (PAM3) Guides Partner Visa Decisions
What the Procedures Advice Manual is, why it is not law, how a delegate must still apply the Migration Act and Regulations, and how the Tribunal treats departmental policy.
Read the guide →