Sydney's Profile

Sydney’s population of over four million enjoys living in a dynamic, multicultural city with a balmy climate.
They also suffer some of the downsides of big city life, such as traffic jams, frustrations with public transport and concerns about crime.

Sydney attracts more immigrants than any other Australian city. Large numbers of relocating Australians are also drawn by career opportunities in Sydney.

In quality of life surveys, Australian cities score consistently well compared with cities in other countries. As you might expect, Sydney rates very well but its overall score is lower than it might be because crime rates are similar to London’s and New York’s. Fortunately, there are plenty of areas in Sydney with low crime rates.

It’s fair to say some families with children have found other cities meet their lifestyle requirements better than Sydney does. Nevertheless, many migrants with children are happy they chose Sydney.

If you don’t have children, and you want to live in an exciting city, Sydney is almost certainly your ideal Australian location.

Around 40,000 new people move to Sydney each year and around 15,000 new homes are built to accommodate them.

According to the Bureau of Statistics, almost forty percent of Sydney’s residents were born overseas.

People from the UK are Sydney’s biggest migrant group, making up 5 percent of the population.

The next biggest groups are Chinese (2%), New Zealanders (2%), Vietnamese (1%), Lebanese (1%) and Italian (1%). Many smaller migrant groups, such as people originating in Hong Kong, The Philippines, Greece, India and Korea also contribute to Sydney’s population.

Around 11% of Sydney’s population is Asian, 3% come from the Middle East or North Africa and 1% from the rest of Africa – mainly South Africa. Aboriginal Australians represent about 1% of Sydney’s population.

People from Sydney are known as Sydneysiders.