Most international students will no longer be able to bring dependants to Australia as the government moves to tighten the country’s temporary migration system.
Exceptions will apply to PhD students, Pacific and ASEAN nationals, DFAT and Defence-sponsored students and foreign government scholarship recipients.
Students already in Australia will be protected by “grandfathering provisions” intended “to avoid separation of families”, a spokesperson for the Department of Home Affairs confirmed to The PIE News.
But the changes will also prevent family members from subsequently applying for a Student or Temporary Graduate visa as a secondary applicant once the primary visa holder has been granted their visa.
That restriction will apply to “all current and future student and temporary graduate visa holders onshore and offshore”, including those in the exempt groups, according to Home Affairs.
The government has yet to confirm when the changes will take effect or provide the full details of how they will operate.
The family restrictions form part of a wider migration overhaul announced by Home Affairs minister Tony Burke last week, which the government says is designed to deliver budget forecasts for net overseas migration (NOM) of 245,000 in 2026/27 and 225,000 in 2027/28. The government says NOM has already fallen 47% from its post-Covid peak
Burke has also explicitly linked the reforms to the government’s desire to tackle “visa hopping”, while acknowledging that some movement between temporary visas represents the migration system “working at its absolute best” – for example, where a student studies an area of skills shortage, moves to a graduate visa and subsequently obtains employer sponsorship and permanent residence.
Speaking to The PIE, policy commentator Abul Rizvi said: “The announcement that further onshore student visas will in future only be available to students moving up the AQF hierarchy sounds like a positive change but we will have to wait for the details on how this will be implemented.”
He questioned how the rules would apply in cases where students move between courses at the same qualification level, and warned that education providers could find ways around the intended restrictions.
“Education providers will get innovative in this area that will thwart what the government is trying to do.”
Rizvi said that “a crucial question that remains unclear… what will now happen to government policy on the very high student visa refusal rates and on the student National Planning Level (NPL).”
“If the 295,000 student NPL is to be delivered in 2026 and 2027… that would make it very difficult to deliver the NOM target of 245,000 in 2026/27 and 225,000 in 2027/28.”
The government has maintained the student NPL at 295,000 for 2027, while simultaneously seeking to reduce NOM.
“The very high student refusal rate since November 2025 was a key contributor to bringing down NOM in the March quarter of 2026 and is likely to have had a similar effect in the June quarter of 2026 and the September quarter of 2026,” he said.
“But to deliver the NPL, the refusal rate has to fall significantly. If they deliver the NPL, it makes it much less likely they will deliver the NOM targets. Something has to give.”
But to deliver the NPL, the refusal rate has to fall significantly. If they deliver the NPL, it makes it much less likely they will deliver the NOM targets. Something has to give
Abul Rizvi
Asked how well the current international student-to-skilled migration pathway matches Australia’s skills needs, Rizvi said: “The biggest mismatches result from the fact there is no targeting of the temporary graduate visa and there is no targeting of onshore student visas.
“The temporary graduates who have done a course that is in long term demand will tend to get a skilled job in Australia and will find a pathway to permanent residence,” Rizvi said. “That is a very positive outcome for Australia.”
“The problem from a policy perspective are those who have done a course outside these areas but still desire PR and/or extended stay, particularly in a strong labour market. That contributes to the ‘permanently temporary’ cohort.”
One potential solution is greater transparency around which qualifications and occupations Australia wants to prioritise.
“The government already identifies the occupations that are in high demand through the list of occupations that get invitations in the skilled Independent category,” he said.
“There is no reason this same list…cannot be used…to target temporary graduate visas.”
Rizvi said an annually reviewed list of priority qualifications and occupations would give providers clearer signals about what the government wants.
“It would be better for the government to be completely transparent about the qualifications/occupations it wants,” he said. “That would make it clear to education providers what to prioritise.”
