Published 6 October 2026. Current as at that date. These rules are moving quickly, so check the date before you rely on anything here.
Lodge your student visa from the wrong place now and it is not refused. It is invalid.
That is a different and worse outcome. An invalid application is never decided. There is nothing to appeal. You do not get a bridging visa from it. The Department simply cannot consider it.
This is the sharp edge of the rules that started on 2 October 2026, and it is the part being explained the least. They are the delivery of the migration package announced on 17 September, which we covered when it was still only a speech.
For scale, Department data published on data.gov.au shows 135,979 onshore student visa applications were made in 2025. Not all of those applicants would be caught by the new rules, but it shows how normal applying from inside Australia had become.
First question: when did you lodge?
Lodged before 2 October 2026. The old rules apply to you. Nothing below changes your application.
Lodging on or after 2 October 2026. Everything below applies.
That date is the only thing that decides which rule set you are under.
What the Department says
From the Home Affairs page announcing the change:
The rules change who can apply for and be granted a visa while in Australia, and whether family members can be included.
And, on the same page:
Australia continues to welcome international students. You can still apply for a Student visa if you meet the visa requirements.
Both are true at the same time. The visa still exists. Where you have to be standing when you apply for it has changed.
The main rule
If you hold a student visa, as the main student or as a family member, and you want another student visa as the main student, you must generally be outside Australia when you apply.
It covers the Student visa (subclass 500) and the Student Guardian visa (subclass 590).
The part people are missing
You must also be outside Australia when the visa is granted, not just when you lodge.
So the obvious plan, lodge from overseas then fly straight back and wait here, does not work. You cannot wait in Australia. There is no bridging visa, because you are not in Australia to hold one.
The real cost of this rule is not a short trip. It is however long the Department takes to decide, spent outside the country.
Subsequent entrant applications no longer exist
Family members must now apply at the same time and the same place as the main student.
There is no longer a separate subsequent entrant student visa application. If the plan was for your partner to join you next year, that pathway is closed.
Who can still include family
- Defence or Foreign Affairs student
- The main student holds a Pacific nation or ASEAN passport
- The main student is enrolled in a doctoral degree
- The course is funded by a foreign government
- The family member already held a student visa on 2 October 2026
- A child born in Australia after 2 October 2026
- The completing studies and provider default cases, for family members already here
Ground five matters. Families already here are protected. What has closed is adding new people.
Three more changes
The 28 day pathway is gone. If your student visa expired within the previous 28 days there used to be an onshore option. It has been removed, with a narrow exception for Administrative Review Tribunal cases.
Provider transfers are locked until 1 July 2027. The restriction was due to ease. Instead it was extended. Twelve months with your original provider, reducing to six later.
Skilled processing priorities changed. Ministerial Directions 121 and 122 took effect on 19 September and replaced Direction 119. Tier one is construction, healthcare, teaching, agriculture, aquaculture, fishing and resources.
What is not law yet
Two things are being reported as done. They are not.
The 485 family ban. The Minister said family attachment would end for graduate visas as well as students. No regulation has been made and no start date exists. The Department’s 485 page still allows family members.
The working holiday ballot. A ballot for the second and third year visas was announced. Nothing has been registered.
What to do
Finishing a course soon. Check whether your next course is a step up or sideways. Sideways means applying from outside Australia.
Partner still overseas. They come on the same application at the same time, or they need their own reason to be here.
On a 417, 462, 482, 407 or 408. You cannot lodge a student application onshore at all.
Visa close to expiring. Do not let it lapse. The 28 day safety net is gone.
Thinking of changing provider. Check your start date against the twelve month rule first.
The short version
Australia still grants student visas. What has gone is the ability to stay in the country while you get the next one, and the ability to bring family across later.
If your plan assumed you could apply from inside Australia, check it before you enrol, not after.
Book a free 30 minute consultation. Bring your current visa grant letter, your CoE and the course you are planning. We will tell you honestly whether your plan still works.
Navneet Verma, MARN 2518975
AuzRoo Immigration Consultants, Canberra ACT
Sources
- Changes to Student visa application rules (subclasses 500 and 590), Department of Home Affairs
- Migration (Student Visa Applications to Be Made from outside Australia) Instrument 2026, F2026L01348, registered 1 October 2026, made under Schedule 1 to the Migration Regulations 1994. The specified visa table is at section 6. It repeals the earlier instrument in full.
- Migration Amendment (Student Visa Reform) Regulations 2026, commenced 2 October 2026
- Migration (LIN 20/158: Class of Persons for Student (Temporary) (Class TU) Visa Applications) Amendment Instrument 2026
- National Code of Practice for Providers of Education and Training to Overseas Students Amendment (Overseas Student Transfers) Instrument 2026
- Skilled visa processing priorities, Ministerial Directions 121 and 122, effective 19 September 2026, Department of Home Affairs
- Student Visa Program dataset, data.gov.au. Onshore application count as analysed by higher education policy analyst Andrew Norton.
- Transcript, Speech, National Press Club, The Hon Tony Burke MP, Minister for Home Affairs, 17 September 2026
Nothing on this page is personal immigration advice. Your circumstances decide your options.
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