Eight systems, not one: three general licences, one sold by activity, three with no licence at all, and one we could not verify. Every figure below was read from the agency that sets it on the date shown on its page, and the price is the same for residents and visitors.
| State | System | From | Agency | Read on | Waters covered |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| New South Wales | General licence | A$7.00 | DPIRD NSW | 2026-09-23 | 182 |
| Victoria | General licence | A$10.00 | VFA | 2026-09-23 | 125 |
| Queensland | No licence; permit for some waters | A$13.60 | Queensland DPI | 2026-09-23 | 153 |
| South Australia | No licence | — | PIRSA | 2026-09-23 | 37 |
| Western Australia | By activity | A$40.00 | DPIRD WA | 2026-09-23 | 34 |
| Tasmania | General licence | A$29.00 | IFS Tasmania | 2026-09-23 | 86 |
| Northern Territory | No licence | — | NT Fisheries | 2026-09-23 | 23 |
| Australian Capital Territory | No licence | — | ACT Government | 2026-09-23 | 3 |
All fishing in NSW waters, fresh and salt: line fishing, spearfishing, hand gathering, trapping, bait collecting and prawn netting, and possessing fishing gear in, on or next to the water.. 182 waters covered.
All forms of recreational fishing in all Victorian marine, estuarine and inland waters: line fishing, bait and shellfish collection, yabby fishing, prawning and spearfishing, and using or possessing fishing equipment in, on or next to Victorian waters.. 125 waters covered.
Queensland has no general recreational fishing licence for salt or fresh water. 153 waters covered.
South Australia has no recreational fishing licence. 37 waters covered.
Licences are sold by activity, not as one general licence. 34 waters covered.
Angling in Tasmania’s inland waters, lakes and rivers, for the 2026-27 season, unchanged from 2025-26. 86 waters covered.
The NT Government states that you do not need a recreational fishing licence or a recreational boat licence in the Northern Territory. 23 waters covered.
Recreational fishing in the public waters of the Australian Capital Territory needs no licence; the rules of the ACT Fisheries Act apply, and the public waters are divided into open waters, trout waters and prohibited waters on the directorate’s map. 3 waters covered.
Who pays less, or nothing, in each system, as the agency words it.
New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania sell a general licence: pay it and you may fish, with exemptions for children, seniors and card holders that each state defines. Western Australia licenses the activity rather than the person, so a rod on the beach needs nothing and a tinnie needs a boat licence. Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory have no general licence and manage the fishery through limits, closures and, in Queensland and South Australia, permits for particular waters. The prices, where they exist, run from A$7 for three days in New South Wales to A$115.50 for a two-rod season in Tasmania, and none of them charges a visitor more than a resident.
A state without a licence is not a state without rules. Queensland runs some of the most detailed recreational rules in the country, with a closed season for barramundi on the east coast and the coral reef fin fish rules; South Australia publishes size, bag and boat limits for every species that matters and changes its snapper closure when the stock needs it; the Territory protects species outright and regulates access to Aboriginal land. Each state page on this site links the rule page that applies, and each water page links the one for its water.
Two of the no-licence states sell permits for particular waters, and they are easy to miss. Queensland’s Stocked Impoundment Permit covers line fishing in the sixty-odd dams the scheme stocks, from age 18, at A$13.60 a week or A$64.58 a year with a concession rate for card holders, and the money funds the stocking groups that keep those dams full of native fish that cannot breed there. South Australia opens its drinking-water reservoirs to fishing one by one under a permit with conditions of access set per reservoir. Neither permit is a licence, neither applies outside its waters, and both are sold online by the agency.
Every figure in the table above was read on the page of the agency that sets it, on the date shown in each row. The Australian Capital Territory’s pages refused automated reading on 23 September 2026 and were read in an ordinary browser the same day: no licence is needed in the ACT’s public waters and the Fisheries Act rules apply. Tasmania’s inland fees are the 2026-27 schedule, identical to the year before, and are re-read each July. When a page cannot be read, this site publishes the gap rather than a third-party summary, and the verification log records it.
It depends on the state. New South Wales, Victoria, Tasmania sell a general licence; Western Australia licenses activities such as fishing from a boat; Queensland, South Australia, Northern Territory, Australian Capital Territory have no general licence and rely on limits, permits and closures instead. The rule for the Australian Capital Territory is not yet verified on this site.
No. Recreational fishing is managed by each state and territory, and a licence from one is not valid in another; Lake Hume, on the border, is the classic case where the state boundary decides which licence applies.
No. Unlike the United States, Australian licences cost the same for residents and visitors; what changes is the concessions, for juniors, seniors and pensioners, which each agency defines.
From the agency itself or its service portal: Service NSW, Service Victoria, DPIRD in Western Australia, the Inland Fisheries Service in Tasmania, and the Queensland Government’s permit portal for the stocked dams. Each state page on this site links the official channel.