Updates

Proposed Visitor Visa Restrictions on Onshore Partner Visas (2026)

As at 23 September 2026 the law had not changed: a visitor visa holder in Australia could still lodge a valid onshore partner visa application, and the restriction reported in August 2026 remained a proposal only.

Last reviewed 23 September 2026General information, not legal advice

A person holding a visitor visa in Australia could still make a valid subclass 820 and 801 partner visa application onshore, on the same terms as before. This page records what was reported in August 2026, what the position was a month later, and how such a change would have to be made if it happened.

What was reported in August 2026

It was reported in August 2026 that the government was considering preventing people who enter Australia on visitor visas from applying for certain family visas, including partner visas, while they are in Australia. The effect described was that such a person would have to apply from outside Australia instead — for a partner, the offshore subclass 309 and 100 rather than the onshore 820 and 801.

That is the whole of what was reported: an indication of something under consideration, not a rule.

What the position was as at 23 September 2026

Key facts

As at 23 September 2026 there was no legislation, no regulation, no commencement date and no transitional arrangement. The law governing who may make a valid onshore partner visa application was unchanged. Nothing about it should be treated as settled, and nothing about it should be acted on.

Specifically, on that date:

No amending Act had been introduced or made. A restriction of this kind would sit in, or be authorised by, the Migration Act 1958.
No legislative instrument had been registered. Changes to who can validly apply are normally made by amending the Migration Regulations 1994, and every such amendment is registered on the Federal Register of Legislation.
No commencement date had been announced. Without one, there is no "before" and no "after".
No transitional arrangements had been released. These decide who a change reaches. For a person who has already lodged they are the most important part of any migration amendment, and they did not exist.

The distinction between a proposal and a rule is not pedantry. Measures are announced and never made, or made in a much narrower form than the one first described, or commenced years later with carve-outs nobody mentioned at the announcement. None of that can be predicted from a report.

The two ways a change like this could be made

This section is about mechanism, not prediction. Nothing below had happened as at 23 September 2026. It is here because the two routes explain why the answer to "would it affect me?" depends so completely on the drafting.

1. Wider use of no further stay conditions

Section 41(2)(a) of the Migration Act 1958 allows the regulations to provide that a visa is subject to a condition that its holder will not, after entering Australia, be entitled to be granted a substantive visa while they remain in Australia. That is condition 8503, the "no further stay" condition, in Schedule 8 to the Migration Regulations 1994. Which visas carry it is set by Schedule 2: for the subclass 600 visitor visa, some streams must have conditions including 8503 imposed, while for others it may be imposed. That is why two people with the same visa subclass can have different conditions.

Making 8503 mandatory across more visitor visa streams would be an amendment to those Schedule 2 clauses. Its effect would be delayed rather than immediate: a condition attaches when a visa is granted, so it would reach people granted visitor visas after it commenced, not people already here on a visa that does not carry it. Waiver would remain governed by regulation 2.05(4) of the Migration Regulations 1994, which requires that compelling and compassionate circumstances have developed since the visa was granted, over which the person had no control, and that resulted in a major change to their circumstances — a narrow test. The Department also states that a waiver must be approved before a partner visa application is made. See condition 8503 no further stay.

2. Amending the Schedule 1 validity requirements

Section 46 of the Migration Act 1958 provides that a visa application is valid only if it satisfies the criteria and requirements prescribed under that section. For the onshore partner visa those requirements are in Schedule 1 item 1214C of the Migration Regulations 1994, which already sets out who may apply and how — including that the applicant must be in Australia but not in immigration clearance, and that certain regional provisional visa holders must have held their visa for a minimum period first.

Adding a class of person to that item is the direct route, and its effect differs in kind from the first. An application caught by it would not be refused; it would be invalid — never made, with the money and bridging visa consequences that follow. A change of this sort would ordinarily operate on applications made on or after commencement, but that is a matter for the transitional provision, not something to assume.

What it would and would not mean for someone who has already lodged

Nothing can be stated with confidence, because the answer lives in a transitional provision that does not exist. What can be said is how the question is framed.

An application validly made before a change commenced is one the Department must deal with. A later amendment to the Schedule 1 validity requirements does not reach back and unmake it unless the instrument expressly says so, which would be unusual. A change working through condition 8503 does not touch a lodged application at all, because the condition governs whether an application can be made, not whether one succeeds.

What a change could not do is fix a problem that already exists. If you do not currently hold a substantive visa, the Schedule 3 criteria already apply to you. If your visitor visa carries condition 8503 and no waiver has been approved, you already cannot validly apply. Those are current obstacles, not future ones.

What to do about a proposal

Nothing, as a proposal. Nobody should rush an application, or abandon one, on the strength of something that is not law. A rushed partner application is a thin one, and the gaps show: these cases are decided on the four relationship matters, and material assembled in a fortnight rarely covers them. Delaying is worse in a different way, because a visitor visa runs out on a fixed date and losing substantive status changes the application you are able to make.

Decide on today's law and your own facts. Where the timing is genuinely tight — a visa expiring soon, a waiver request pending, a previous refusal in the background — an application prepared by an Australian migration lawyer is more likely to succeed, because sequencing is the question they answer for a living and a misjudged lodgement date costs the whole charge.

How this page is kept current

This page states the position as at 23 September 2026 and will be updated if the position changes. It does not name or link to any news outlet or commentary, because neither is a source of law. Check for yourself before relying on it: the Department publishes the current requirements on its subclass 820 partner visa pages, and any change would appear first as an amendment to the Migration Act 1958 or the Migration Regulations 1994 on the Federal Register of Legislation.

What to do next

If you are on a visitor visa now, check your conditions and expiry date in VEVO today and read applying from a visitor visa, which sets out the checks in order. For everything else that has and has not changed, see partner visa updates, and for the lodgement steps, how to apply for the 820 visa.

Common questions

Can a visitor visa holder still apply for a partner visa onshore?

As at 23 September 2026, yes. The law had not changed. A person holding a visitor visa can make a valid subclass 820 and 801 application while in Australia, provided the visa carries no condition preventing a further stay and the other validity requirements are met. Check the Department of Home Affairs pages for the current position before you lodge, because this page states the position on one date only.

Has the proposed restriction on visitor visas become law?

No. As at 23 September 2026 no legislation had been introduced or made, no regulation had been registered, no commencement date had been announced and no transitional arrangements had been released. A change becomes law in this area when an amending Act or a legislative instrument amending the Migration Regulations 1994 is made and registered on the Federal Register of Legislation.

Should I rush my partner visa application before the rules change?

A proposal is not a deadline. Rushing produces thin applications, and evidence gaps in a partner application are slow and expensive to fix. Abandoning a plan is equally risky, because letting a substantive visa expire brings the Schedule 3 criteria into play. Decide on the law as it stands, on your own circumstances, and get advice if the timing is tight.

Would a change affect an application I have already lodged?

That depends entirely on the transitional provisions written into whatever instrument makes the change, and no such instrument existed as at 23 September 2026. Amending instruments in this area usually state which applications they apply to, commonly by reference to the date the application was made. Until there is an instrument, there is nothing to read and nobody can answer the question.

Where will the change appear if it happens?

On the Federal Register of Legislation, as an amendment to the Migration Act 1958 or the Migration Regulations 1994, and then on the Department of Home Affairs subclass 820 and 801 pages. Those are the places to check. News reports and commentary are not law and often describe options that are never made.