British Backpacker Boom Takes New Route in Australia
British backpackers are visiting Australia in record numbers, but the traditional working holiday has changed. The old journey north is disappearing as a result of changes to the working holiday visa rules.
A surge in British backpackers visiting Australia has taken a different path, with changes to the working holiday visa rules leading to a shift away from the traditional journey north.
For generations of young Britons, Australia came with an unwritten itinerary: arrive in Sydney, find a hostel, and then head north to clock up the specified work needed to extend a working holiday visa. However, under the Australia-UK free trade agreement, British backpackers no longer have to complete specified work to get a second or third working holiday visa, and the age limit was raised from 30 to 35.
More than 79,000 working holiday visas were granted to British citizens in 2024–25, up almost 70 per cent on the previous year. However, the traditional working holiday has changed, with fewer British backpackers heading north without the 88-day visa requirement.
Dan McConnell, the British-born general manager of Mad Monkey Backpackers, knows this shift firsthand. He arrived in Australia on a working holiday visa in 2015 and traveled the east coast before securing permanent residency in Cairns. Now, he said, British backpackers have far less reason to make the same journey.