Which state is easiest to get a 190 nomination from for my occupation?

The honest answer is that the question itself is the wrong frame. State 190 programs change occupation lists and thresholds quarterly and often without public notice, so a state that nominated easily for a given ANZSCO code last quarter may be closed or capped this quarter. The right question is which states are currently running the occupation, where the candidate's points score and work-experience profile clears the state-program threshold, and where the family's settlement-intent evidence is credible. We work that question case by case rather than offering a generic ranking that is wrong for half the applicants who would read it.

What happens if I leave the nominating state before the two years are up?

The 190 is permanent on grant and carries no visa condition equivalent to the 491's condition 8579, so leaving the nominating state inside the two-year window does not cancel the visa. It does have consequences. The settlement-intent claim the candidate made to the state was a representation, and states share residence and employment data with each other and with the Department. A future migration application, whether for citizenship readiness, family sponsorship, or business mobility, can be read against the original 190 nomination file, and a contradiction is a discoverable issue. The two-year residence-and-work commitment is a good-faith obligation; the right way to treat it is as binding even though it is not coded as a condition.

Can I lodge nomination applications with multiple states at the same time?

Yes, with two important constraints. The single EOI in SkillSelect can flag interest to multiple states in parallel, and that part is administrative. The separate state nomination applications, however, each require a state-specific settlement-intent file that holds up to scrutiny. A candidate who lodges identical generic files with VIC, QLD, and SA on the same day is making a strategic error, because each file looks like the others and none looks like a serious commitment to the specific state. Parallel applications work where the candidate has a genuine connection or a credible plan in more than one state, and they work less well where the rationale is purely opportunistic.

What evidence do states actually want for settlement intent?

The strongest files combine occupation-specific employer enquiries in the state (named employers, dated correspondence, ideally responses), accommodation research with addresses in the target city or region, school enquiries for school-age children where applicable, and documented family or community ties where they exist. Prior study or work history in the state, even short visits, sits high in the evidence hierarchy. The weakest files are letters that assert intent without supporting it, and they are read by state assessors as exactly that. A settlement-intent file that would not change at all if the state name were swapped from VIC to QLD is not a settlement-intent file.

How do state processing times affect my EOI strategy?

State nomination processing is decoupled from the Commonwealth invitation rounds and runs on each state's own calendar. A state that processes in eight weeks at the start of a program year may sit at twenty weeks by the third quarter as the nomination ceiling fills. The strategic implication is that a 190 plan needs to add the state processing window on top of the skills assessment window, the EOI lodgement window, and the Department processing window, and the total often runs longer than candidates estimate when they read a single processing-time figure for the visa subclass alone. A plan that assumes a six-month total is rarely a 190 plan.

What if my occupation is on the federal MLTSSL but not on my preferred state's list?

The federal list sets the outer perimeter of eligibility for points-tested GSM visas; the state lists carve a working list inside that perimeter. An occupation on the federal MLTSSL but off a specific state's 190 list is simply not nominable through that state in that program year, regardless of points score. The practical options are to apply to a state that does publish the occupation, to wait for a program-year list refresh which may add the occupation back, or to reframe as a 189 if the score is independently competitive. There is no workaround inside the 190 itself for an occupation a state has chosen not to run.

Does the 190 give the same permanent residence as the 189?

Yes, on grant. The 190 is a permanent visa with the same legal effect as the 189: indefinite work rights, indefinite study rights, Medicare access, and a citizenship pathway on the standard residence calendar. The only operational difference is the good-faith two-year residence-and-work commitment to the nominating state. After two years, the candidate can move anywhere in Australia without any migration consequence, and the visa itself never required a state-residence condition to be coded against it.

AU · Australia

Skilled Nominated Visa (Subclass 190)

Subclass 190 Skilled Nominated visa: state-by-state nomination strategy, +5 bonus modelled, settlement-intent evidence built, lodgement managed by a MARA agent.

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At a glance

The Subclass 190 Skilled Nominated visa is a permanent, points-tested visa granted with nomination from an Australian state or territory government. It adds 5 points to the SkillSelect score, smaller than the +15 the 491 carries, and it requires a good-faith two-year residence-and-work commitment to the nominating state. The page is built around one decision: which state to target and whether the family circumstances support a credible settlement claim there for at least two years. The state-by-state matrix below is the working tool for that decision; the rest of the page is the law and practice the matrix sits inside. The 190 is the right visa when the score clears the state-program bar with the +5 bonus and the settlement-intent claim is genuine. When the score does not clear the bar, the 491 lifts it further at the cost of regional residence. When the score clears the 189 bar unaided, the 189 is the cleaner permanent grant.

Who qualifies

Eligibility

01

Under 45 at the date of invitation, not at EOI submission

The age cap for the 190 is measured on the date the invitation issues from SkillSelect, not on the day the Expression of Interest is lodged. State nomination queues add a delay layer on top of the federal EOI ranking, so candidates lodging in their early forties often find that the binding constraint is the age clock rather than the points score. Age also drives the points total directly, with 25 to 32 attracting the maximum 30 points and the score falling sharply after 40.
02

Nominated occupation on the relevant state list, which is not the federal MLTSSL

The 190 draws from the MLTSSL and the STSOL, but the operative list is the one the nominating state or territory publishes for its own 190 program in the current program year. Each of NSW, VIC, QLD, SA, WA, TAS, ACT and NT runs its own list, with its own occupation flags, sub-lists, and pathways. An occupation that is eligible federally may be closed, capped, or off the list entirely in a given state. Treating the federal MLTSSL as a proxy for state eligibility is the single most common 190 file error. The lists are built against ANZSCO 2013 for points-tested GSM visas.
03

Positive skills assessment from the relevant assessing authority

The assessing authority is occupation-specific: Engineers Australia for engineers, ACS for ICT roles, VETASSESS for most professional and trade categories outside engineering and ICT, TRA for the trade occupations it covers. The assessment must be positive and valid at the date of invitation. The default validity is three years from issue unless the authority specifies a shorter period, in which case the shorter period applies.
04

Competent English at minimum, with a clear points ladder above

Competent English (IELTS 6 in each component, or equivalent PTE Academic, TOEFL iBT, CAE, OET) is the entry requirement and scores zero English points. Proficient English (IELTS 7) adds 10 points. Superior English (IELTS 8) adds 20 points. Some state programs specify Proficient as a program-level threshold above the federal floor, so the right English target is set by the nominating state, not by the federal minimum.
05

A competitive points score that includes the +5 nomination bonus

The legislative minimum to enter the EOI pool is 65 points. State nomination adds 5 points to the score, materially smaller than the +15 the 491 carries. A raw score of 65 lifts to 70 with nomination, which is below the competitive cut-off in most state programs. The 2025-26 program year allocates 12,850 nomination places to the 190 nationally across all states and territories, with each jurisdiction running to its own ceiling and its own occupation priorities (source: Department migration program planning levels, 2025-26).
06

Genuine intent to live and work in the nominating state for at least two years

State nomination is conditional on a good-faith commitment to settle in the nominating state for at least two years after grant. Evidence of intent is part of the nomination file: job-search records, employer enquiries, accommodation research, family or community ties in the state, and any prior study or work history there. The commitment is not enforced as a visa condition (the 190 is permanent on grant, with no condition 8579 equivalent), but states share data and reputational risk attaches to any future migration application that contradicts the original settlement claim.

Common mistakes

Mistakes that cost a refusal

Applying to a state without genuine intent to settle there. The nomination file asks for evidence of why the candidate chose this state specifically, and a generic letter that would copy-paste to any jurisdiction is read as exactly that. States compare nomination claims against later residence and work data, and a candidate who lands the 190 in WA then moves to Sydney inside the two-year window carries a reputational mark into any future migration interaction, even though the permanent visa itself does not lapse.
Assuming federal MLTSSL eligibility means state-list eligibility. The federal occupation lists set the outer perimeter; each state then carves a working list inside that perimeter with its own occupation flags, sub-lists, and quarterly priorities. An ANZSCO code that is open federally may be closed, capped, or off the state list entirely. The right list to check is the current program-year list published by the specific state, not the Commonwealth list the 189 is read against.
Missing a state-specific work-experience threshold that sits above the federal points-test minimum. Some states require a minimum of 12 months continuous employment in the nominated occupation as a program-entry threshold, separate from and above the federal points-test brackets. A candidate who clears the federal 65 points on a fresh assessment with patchwork experience can be points-eligible at the federal level and program-ineligible at the state level on the same file.
Not factoring state processing times into the EOI strategy. State nomination processing runs on each state's own calendar and is decoupled from the Commonwealth invitation rounds. A state that processes in eight weeks at one point in the program year may sit at twenty weeks later in the same year. Treating state processing as a fixed quantity, rather than a variable that compounds with the federal invitation queue, leads to EOI plans that miscalculate the realistic timeline by months.
Filing a settlement-intent claim that does not survive scrutiny. States read nomination files as advocacy documents and discount unsupported assertion. A claim of intent to settle in Adelaide needs to look like an Adelaide-specific plan: enquiries with Adelaide employers in the nominated occupation, accommodation research with Adelaide addresses, school enquiries for school-age children if applicable, evidence of family or community ties where they exist. Generic willingness to live "anywhere in Australia" is the wrong frame for a state-nominated application.

The process

From first call to grant

01 · 1-2 wk

Strategy and state selection

ANZSCO occupation match against the state lists that actually publish the code, points calculation with the +5 nomination bonus applied, English ladder analysis, honest assessment of which states the family circumstances and settlement evidence will support credibly.

02 · 4-26 wk

Skills assessment

File preparation and lodgement with the relevant assessing authority. Decision timelines range from four to twenty-six weeks depending on the authority, occupation, and whether interview or document review is required.

03 · 4-26 wk

State nomination application

Separate application to the nominating state or territory, with the state's own occupation flag, work-experience threshold, English threshold if higher than federal, and settlement-intent evidence file. State application windows open and close on each program's own calendar.

04 · 1-8 wk

EOI in SkillSelect and invitation

Expression of Interest lodged or updated with the nomination flag and verified +5 bonus. On state nomination, the federal invitation issues directly. The visa application must be lodged inside 60 days of invitation with full health, character, English, skills assessment, and nomination evidence.

05 · 6-12 mo

Department processing and grant

Department of Home Affairs assessment, response to any case-officer requests, and grant of the permanent visa. Published processing times for the 190 currently sit in the six to twelve month range for most files; nomination-stage delays before lodgement run separately and stack on top.

Why use a registered agent

What that buys you

Live state-list intelligence. State 190 programs publish occupation lists, ceilings, and program-specific thresholds at the start of each program year, and amend them through the year without uniform public notice. The choice of which state to apply through, and in what week, has more impact on the timeline than the EOI score itself.
State-by-state strategy by occupation. The right state for an accountant is not the right state for a registered nurse or a software engineer. We map the candidate's ANZSCO code, points score, settlement evidence, and family circumstances against the states currently running the occupation, rather than defaulting to whichever state nominated easily last year.
Multi-state EOI tactics. A single EOI in SkillSelect can flag interest to multiple states simultaneously, but each state nomination is a separate application with its own evidence file and its own settlement-intent claim. Knowing when to lodge in parallel, when to lodge sequentially, and when to focus on one state is a strategic call that compounds across the timeline.
Honest no-go assessment. If the family circumstances do not support a credible settlement claim in any state currently running the occupation, or if the score and occupation combination is uncompetitive across the live programs, we say so before fees are committed and we map the 491 or 189 alternative instead.

We work on a transparent flat fee, quoted at the consultation. We do not publish prices because the right number is the case-specific one.

When the 190 is the right choice

The 190 is the General Skilled Migration lever for candidates whose unaided points score does not reach the 189 competitive cut-off but whose occupation, work history, and family circumstances will support a credible commitment to live and work in a specific Australian state for at least two years. The mechanics are straightforward. State nomination adds 5 points to the SkillSelect score and grants permanent residence on first instance, with no condition tying the holder geographically after the two-year good-faith period is complete. The difficulty is not the mechanics. The difficulty is that the 190 is fundamentally a state-choice problem, and the state landscape is harder to read than the federal one.

The 189 reads against a single Commonwealth list, the MLTSSL, and a single Commonwealth invitation queue. Sister page: Subclass 189 Skilled Independent Visa. The 190 reads against eight separate state and territory lists, eight separate state nomination programs, and eight separate sets of program-specific thresholds for work experience, English, income, and settlement-intent evidence, all running on independent calendars and changing through the program year. An occupation open in NSW may be capped in VIC, off the list in QLD, and prioritised in TAS, in the same week. A plan that treats "the 190" as a single lever rather than a portfolio of state-specific levers misses the actual decision the visa requires.

The choice between the 189, the 190, and the 491 is a points-and-occupation question, not a preference question. A candidate whose unaided score clears the competitive bar in their occupation is on the 189 track. A candidate at 75 to 85 in an occupation a state currently runs is on the 190 track, with the +5 doing the work to clear the state-program threshold. A candidate whose score sits below the 190 cut-off but who is willing and able to live in a designated regional area is on the 491 track with the +15 bonus, covered on the sister page: Subclass 491 Skilled Work Regional Visa. The hub covering all three streams together is at General Skilled Migration to Australia and is the right starting point if the occupation and score are still being worked out.

State-by-state nomination at a glance

State 190 programs change occupation lists, work-experience thresholds, English thresholds, and program-entry criteria through the program year, often without uniform public announcement. The matrix below shows the dimensions that matter for a 190 decision rather than fixed values that would be wrong inside three months. The 2025-26 program year allocates 12,850 nomination places to the 190 nationally across all eight states and territories, of which NSW carries 2,100 (source: Department migration program planning levels, 2025-26). The state-by-state breakdown of the remaining allocation, the current occupation lists, and the current program-entry thresholds change too frequently to commit to a static page; verify the relevant state\'s current settings with a registered agent before any nomination application.

State / Territory	Program status	Occupation list focus	Typical work-experience ask	Settlement evidence ask	Recent processing
NSW	Active; 2,100 places in 2025-26	State-specific list, narrower than MLTSSL; carved by sector priorities	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	Genuine NSW commitment; prior NSW study or work history weighted	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
VIC	Active; allocation [TBC]	State-specific list; sector-prioritised, narrower than MLTSSL	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	VIC-specific settlement file; employer enquiries weighted	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
QLD	Active; allocation [TBC]	State-specific list; sub-lists by candidate stream	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	QLD-specific settlement file; regional-QLD ties may be weighted	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
SA	Active; allocation [TBC]	State-specific list; commonly broader access than larger states for some sectors	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	SA-specific settlement file; Adelaide-area focus typical	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
WA	Active; allocation [TBC]	State-specific list; sub-lists by candidate stream	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	WA-specific settlement file; Perth-area focus typical	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
TAS	Active; allocation [TBC]	State-specific list; smaller state with sector-specific priorities	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	Genuine TAS commitment; prior TAS study or work history weighted	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
ACT	Active; allocation [TBC]	ACT-specific occupation list and matrix-style ranking	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	Canberra-specific ties; matrix model weights residence and employment	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing
NT	Active; allocation [TBC]	Territory-specific list; smallest jurisdiction by allocation	[TBC] confirm current state-program threshold	Darwin-area focus typical; genuine NT commitment required	[TBC] confirm current state-program timing

State criteria change without uniform public notice. Matrix dimensions are current as of May 2026; cell values flagged [TBC] are intentionally left blank because publishing a specific figure that goes stale inside one program quarter is worse than no figure at all. Confirm the relevant state\'s current criteria, allocation, and processing window with a registered agent before lodging any nomination application.

The takeaway is not which state to pick. The takeaway is that the state choice is real, the criteria differ enough across the eight programs that lodging blind to the state landscape is a strategy failure, and the candidate who picks a state on a generic ranking is making the same mistake as the candidate who picks an occupation on a generic ranking. The right state is the one where the points score clears the program threshold, the occupation is currently being run, and the settlement-intent evidence is credible. That intersection is rarely the same for two candidates, which is the whole reason the 190 is built around state nomination rather than a federal queue.

FAQ

Frequently Asked Questions

Which state is easiest to get a 190 nomination from for my occupation? The honest answer is that the question itself is the wrong frame. State 190 programs change occupation lists and thresholds quarterly and often without public notice, so a state that nominated easily for a given ANZSCO code last quarter may be closed or capped this quarter. The right question is which states are currently running the occupation, where the candidate's points score and work-experience profile clears the state-program threshold, and where the family's settlement-intent evidence is credible. We work that question case by case rather than offering a generic ranking that is wrong for half the applicants who would read it.
What happens if I leave the nominating state before the two years are up? The 190 is permanent on grant and carries no visa condition equivalent to the 491's condition 8579, so leaving the nominating state inside the two-year window does not cancel the visa. It does have consequences. The settlement-intent claim the candidate made to the state was a representation, and states share residence and employment data with each other and with the Department. A future migration application, whether for citizenship readiness, family sponsorship, or business mobility, can be read against the original 190 nomination file, and a contradiction is a discoverable issue. The two-year residence-and-work commitment is a good-faith obligation; the right way to treat it is as binding even though it is not coded as a condition.
Can I lodge nomination applications with multiple states at the same time? Yes, with two important constraints. The single EOI in SkillSelect can flag interest to multiple states in parallel, and that part is administrative. The separate state nomination applications, however, each require a state-specific settlement-intent file that holds up to scrutiny. A candidate who lodges identical generic files with VIC, QLD, and SA on the same day is making a strategic error, because each file looks like the others and none looks like a serious commitment to the specific state. Parallel applications work where the candidate has a genuine connection or a credible plan in more than one state, and they work less well where the rationale is purely opportunistic.
What evidence do states actually want for settlement intent? The strongest files combine occupation-specific employer enquiries in the state (named employers, dated correspondence, ideally responses), accommodation research with addresses in the target city or region, school enquiries for school-age children where applicable, and documented family or community ties where they exist. Prior study or work history in the state, even short visits, sits high in the evidence hierarchy. The weakest files are letters that assert intent without supporting it, and they are read by state assessors as exactly that. A settlement-intent file that would not change at all if the state name were swapped from VIC to QLD is not a settlement-intent file.
How do state processing times affect my EOI strategy? State nomination processing is decoupled from the Commonwealth invitation rounds and runs on each state's own calendar. A state that processes in eight weeks at the start of a program year may sit at twenty weeks by the third quarter as the nomination ceiling fills. The strategic implication is that a 190 plan needs to add the state processing window on top of the skills assessment window, the EOI lodgement window, and the Department processing window, and the total often runs longer than candidates estimate when they read a single processing-time figure for the visa subclass alone. A plan that assumes a six-month total is rarely a 190 plan.
What if my occupation is on the federal MLTSSL but not on my preferred state's list? The federal list sets the outer perimeter of eligibility for points-tested GSM visas; the state lists carve a working list inside that perimeter. An occupation on the federal MLTSSL but off a specific state's 190 list is simply not nominable through that state in that program year, regardless of points score. The practical options are to apply to a state that does publish the occupation, to wait for a program-year list refresh which may add the occupation back, or to reframe as a 189 if the score is independently competitive. There is no workaround inside the 190 itself for an occupation a state has chosen not to run.
Does the 190 give the same permanent residence as the 189? Yes, on grant. The 190 is a permanent visa with the same legal effect as the 189: indefinite work rights, indefinite study rights, Medicare access, and a citizenship pathway on the standard residence calendar. The only operational difference is the good-faith two-year residence-and-work commitment to the nominating state. After two years, the candidate can move anywhere in Australia without any migration consequence, and the visa itself never required a state-residence condition to be coded against it.

Next step

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