Finding a Job in Australia as a Migrant

Before you apply for a single job, you need to know exactly what your visa allows. In Australia, your right to work, and any limits on it, is set by your visa, not by your nationality. Some visas let you work with no restrictions, some cap your hours, and some do not permit work at all. Importantly, a Visitor visa or an Electronic Travel Authority (ETA) does NOT allow you to work, and working on one is unlawful.

The free tool for this is VEVO (Visa Entitlement Verification Online), run by the Department of Home Affairs. Log in with your passport details and visa grant or reference number, and it shows your visa conditions in plain language. You can also email proof of your conditions straight to an employer, which is exactly what a good Australian employer will ask for before hiring you.

Reassuring point: once you are working, Australian workplace law protects you the same as anyone else, regardless of your visa. You are entitled to at least the minimum wage, a pay slip every pay, and protection from exploitation. If something is wrong, you can report it, and there are protections in place so that raising a workplace problem does not put your visa at risk. The Fair Work Ombudsman (fairwork.gov.au, Infoline 13 13 94) is the free, confidential place to get help.

• Always verify your own conditions in VEVO first; do not rely on what a recruiter or friend tells you.

• Save the VEVO PDF so you can send it to employers quickly.

• If your visa has a work limit, you must stay within it, breaching a visa condition can affect your visa.

Every visa is different, and the rules change, so always confirm yours on homeaffairs.gov.au or in VEVO. As a general 2026 guide to the most common situations migrants find themselves in:

• Student visa (subclass 500): you can work up to 48 hours per fortnight while your course is in session (roughly three days a week), and unlimited hours when your course is not in session, e.g. during scheduled breaks. Master's by research and doctoral students can work more.

• Working Holiday (subclass 417) and Work and Holiday (subclass 462): broad work rights, but generally limited to 6 months with any one employer under condition 8547 (some exemptions apply, and you can request permission to stay longer in certain cases). The 417 is for people aged 18 to 30 (up to 35 for some nationalities), and ages and eligible-country lists change.

• Temporary Graduate (subclass 485): for recent international graduates with the skills Australia needs, it lets you live, study and work in Australia temporarily, with full work rights during its validity.

• Skilled visas (subclass 189 Independent, 190 Nominated, 491 Regional): permanent or provisional, points-tested, and they let you work in Australia. The 189 allows you to live and work permanently anywhere in Australia.

Volatile area, confirm before relying on it: hour limits, age cut-offs, eligible occupations and the exact conditions on each visa are reviewed regularly. Check your visa grant letter and VEVO, and confirm the current rule on homeaffairs.gov.au.

A Tax File Number (TFN) is your personal reference number in Australia's tax and superannuation systems. You do not strictly need one to start work, but without it your employer must tax you at the highest rate, so get one early. It is free.

If you are a permanent migrant or a temporary visitor with a valid work-rights visa, you can apply online through the ATO using Individual Auto Registration (IAR). It takes about 20 minutes, you must already be in Australia, and your visa must be linked to the passport you apply with. The ATO posts your TFN to your Australian address, which can take up to 28 days, so apply soon after you arrive.

Critical scam warning: applying for a TFN is always free and only ever done through ato.gov.au. Ignore any website that charges a 'processing fee' to get you a TFN, those are middle-men profiting from a free government service. Never put your TFN on your resume or job application; you only give it to an employer after you have started the job.

A note on superannuation (super): your employer must pay a percentage of your earnings into a super fund for your retirement, on top of your wage. When you start a job you can usually choose your own fund or use your employer's default. This is your money, keep your fund details and check your pay slips show super being paid.

Australia's job market runs mostly on a handful of well-known platforms. The big three are Seek (seek.com.au, the largest local job board), Indeed (au.indeed.com) and LinkedIn, where many professional and recruiter-driven roles are advertised and where networking happens. Set up profiles on all three, turn on email alerts for your role and city, and apply early, listings move fast.

Do not overlook the free, official tools. Workforce Australia (workforceaustralia.gov.au) is the government's job site and has free online learning modules, resume and cover-letter guidance and templates. Services Australia points job-seekers there and to Job Jumpstart for practical, tailored job-search tips.

Safety tip straight from Services Australia: use trusted job-search sites rather than roles only posted on social media, check a site's privacy policy before uploading your resume, and only share your resume on safe platforms. Many roles, especially in hospitality, trades, retail and aged care, are also filled through industry-specific sites, recruitment agencies and word of mouth, which is where networking pays off.

• Seek and Indeed: best for volume and most advertised roles.

• LinkedIn: best for professional roles, recruiters and building a network.

• Workforce Australia: free government board plus free resume and interview training.

The 'CV' in Australia is usually called a resume, and the local style is concise, plain and achievement-focused, typically 2 to 4 pages. Crucially, leave OFF the personal details that are common in many other countries: do not include a photo, your date of birth, age, marital status, religion or nationality. Australian employers do not expect these, and including them can work against you.

A strong Australian resume typically includes: your name and contact details (an Australian phone number and email help), a short professional summary, your key skills, then work history in reverse-chronological order with bullet points that show results (what you achieved, not just duties), followed by education and any Australian licences or qualifications. List 2 to 3 referees or write 'available on request'.

Tailor every application to the specific job. Read the job ad, mirror its key words, and address the 'selection criteria' if the ad lists them. A cover letter should be one page: open by naming the role and where you saw it, use the middle to match your experience to what they asked for, and close by asking for an interview. Address it to the named contact if there is one.

Two honest tips for migrants: (1) translate your experience into Australian terms, convert overseas job titles, qualifications and currencies into local equivalents. (2) Australian employers value local references and local experience highly, so even casual, volunteer or short-term Australian work on your resume helps a lot, which leads to the next section.

The most common frustration migrants describe is the 'no local experience' barrier. Australian employers often favour candidates who have worked here, partly for references they can check and partly for familiarity with local workplace culture. The good news: you can build local experience deliberately, and it does not have to be in your eventual career field.

Practical ways to get your first Australian line on the resume: take a casual, part-time or temp role to start, volunteer (Volunteering Australia and local community organisations are a recognised, respected path), do short courses or get any required Australian licences or tickets (e.g. a White Card for construction, an RSA for hospitality, or recognition of overseas qualifications), and use a recruitment agency for temp work.

Networking is genuinely how a large share of jobs are filled here, many never get advertised. Build a LinkedIn presence, attend industry meetups and migrant employment programs, and ask for short 'informational chats' rather than directly asking for a job. Many councils, settlement services and not-for-profits run free job-readiness and mentoring programs specifically for new migrants.

Be patient and flexible. Services Australia's own advice is that it can take time to find the right job, and that you already have valuable skills, you may just need help presenting them in an Australian way. Treat your first local job as a stepping stone, not the destination.

For many skilled and licensed occupations, you will need your overseas qualifications and experience formally assessed before you can work in the role, or use them for a skilled visa. This is done by an official 'assessing authority' tied to your occupation, not by Home Affairs itself.

Examples of assessing authorities: Engineers Australia for engineering occupations, the Australian Computer Society (ACS) for IT roles, and VETASSESS for many general professional and trade occupations (VETASSESS conducts trade assessments on behalf of Trades Recognition Australia). Regulated professions, such as medicine, nursing, teaching and law, have their own registration boards you must satisfy before practising.

The full, current list of assessing authorities by occupation is published on the Department of Home Affairs skills-assessment page. Start there, find your occupation, and follow that authority's process, fees, timeframes and document requirements. A positive skills assessment is also a building block of the points-tested skilled visas.

This area is detailed and occupation-specific, so confirm the right authority and current requirements on homeaffairs.gov.au before paying any assessment fees.

Job and recruitment scams target migrants and job-seekers heavily. In a recent year, scammers stole $19.6 million from Australians looking for work, an increase of more than 740%, with a median loss of $6,000. Knowing the warning signs protects both your money and your visa.

Treat these as red flags from Scamwatch (run by the ACCC): a recruiter contacts you out of the blue via WhatsApp, Telegram or Signal; you are promised high pay from home for little effort; the 'hiring' is instant with no real interview; you are asked to top up an account with your own money or cryptocurrency to 'complete tasks'; the job involves moving money, buying things or receiving packages for someone else (a money-mule scam); or you must pay a 'recruitment fee' or for 'training materials' before you start.

Golden rules: a legitimate Australian employer never asks you to pay to get a job, and you never put your TFN or bank details on a resume. Verify any recruiter using contact details you find independently, not the ones they give you. Report scams to Scamwatch (scamwatch.gov.au), and if you have paid, call your bank immediately and change your passwords.

On visa advice specifically: only an OMARA-registered migration agent or an Australian legal practitioner can lawfully be paid to give you immigration advice or lodge an application for you. Check any agent for free on the OMARA register (mara.gov.au), if they are not listed, walk away. For anything complex (refusals, appeals, sponsorship, character issues), paying a registered professional is well worth it. For straightforward matters you can also lodge yourself directly with Home Affairs.