Australian Partner Visa Cost: What You Actually Pay

In short: An Australian partner visa is a single combined application. One visa application charge covers both the temporary stage (Subclass 820 onshore or 309 offshore) and the permanent stage (801 or 100), and no further charge falls due when the permanent stage is assessed years later. The Prospective Marriage visa is the exception: it is a separate application, so a second charge arrives at the partner visa stage after you marry. Beyond the charge you should budget for health examinations, police clearances from every country you have lived in, certified translations, and document certification, all of them per person.

One charge, two visas

The most common misunderstanding about Australian partner visa cost is that people expect to pay twice.

You do not. The onshore Subclass 820/801 is a single combined application. You apply once, you pay the visa application charge once, and that charge covers both the temporary Subclass 820 and the permanent Subclass 801 that follows roughly two years later. When the Department assesses the permanent stage, no further application charge falls due.

The offshore pathway works the same way. The Subclass 309 and the Subclass 100 are one application with one charge.

This matters when you are comparing quotes or reading forum threads, because a figure that looks alarming for a temporary visa looks different once you understand it has already bought the permanent one.

The exception: the Prospective Marriage visa

If you take the Subclass 300 Prospective Marriage route, the arithmetic changes.

The Subclass 300 is a separate application, not the first half of a combined one. It lets an engaged couple marry in Australia. Once you have married, you then apply onshore for the Subclass 820/801, and that is a fresh application with its own charge.

So a couple who goes 300 first and partner visa second pays two charges, where a couple who marries overseas and applies for a 309/100 pays one. That does not make the Subclass 300 wrong, and for many couples it is the only workable route. It does mean that when you compare the options you should compare total outlay across the whole path, not the headline charge on the first application.

When you pay, and whether you get it back

The charge is payable in full when you lodge. There is no instalment plan and no deferral.

It is also, in the great majority of cases, not refundable. If the application is refused, the money is gone, and a fresh application means paying again. Withdrawing an application does not usually recover the charge either.

That single fact reframes the whole budget question. The largest avoidable cost in a partner visa is not the charge; it is paying the charge twice because the first application was not ready.

Additional applicant charges

Dependent children included in the application attract their own charges, generally at different rates depending on the child’s age.

Include them at lodgement. Adding a child to an application later, or lodging separately for them afterwards, is normally both more expensive and slower than including them from the start. Family circumstances change over a two-year provisional period, so if a child may need to be included, raise it at the outset rather than mid-process.

The costs that are not the charge

Couples budget for the charge and are then caught out by everything around it. Each of these is per person, which is what makes them add up.

Health examinations with a panel physician nominated by the Department.
Police clearances from every country you have lived in for 12 months or more since turning 16. For anyone with an international working life this is often several, each with its own fee and its own processing time.
Certified translations of any document not in English: birth certificates, marriage certificates, divorce decrees, police clearances.
Document certification where originals cannot be provided.
Relationship registration with a state or territory registry where that is available to you. There is a modest fee, and it is usually worth paying for a reason beyond cost: registration adds real weight to the relationship evidence.
Professional fees, if you engage a registered migration agent. Ask for a written scope before you engage anyone, so you know what is included and what is billed separately.

The costs created by mistakes

Three errors account for most of the avoidable expense we see.

Weak relationship evidence. This is the most common reason partner applications are refused, and a refusal is the most expensive outcome available: you lose the charge, you lose the time, and you start again from the beginning with a refusal on your record.

Bridging visa errors onshore. Work rights are not automatic on every Bridging A visa, and travelling on a Bridging A without first obtaining a Bridging B can cause the Bridging A to cease, leaving the applicant offshore and unlawfully outside the process. Recovering from that costs far more than the paperwork would have.

Letting the Subclass 820 lapse before the 801 is assessed. The provisional stage is not a filing cabinet you close. The relationship has to be maintained and evidenced through it, and the Department must be told about changes, including changes of address and periods of separation.

Costing this out before you commit? Our eligibility check takes about a minute and tells you which pathway applies to your circumstances. For a written verdict on the strength of your evidence before you pay a charge you cannot recover, speak to one of our MARA-registered advisers.

How to budget properly

Build the budget in three layers. First, the application charge for the primary applicant plus each additional applicant, taken from the Department’s own pricing estimator on the day you plan to lodge. Second, the per-person costs: medicals, police clearances from every relevant country, translations, certification. Third, a contingency, because international police clearances in particular have a way of taking longer and costing more than expected.

Then check the charge again before you lodge. Visa application charges are set by the Migration Regulations and are revised periodically, most recently with effect from 1 July 2026. A figure quoted in an article written last year, including this one if you are reading it later, is a starting point and not a basis for payment.

Conclusion

The headline charge is the number everyone searches for, and it is genuinely large. It is also doing more work than most applicants realise, because it has already bought the permanent stage of the visa. What people underestimate is the ring of smaller per-person costs around it, and what they underestimate most is the cost of getting it wrong, since the charge does not come back.

If you would like a considered read on which pathway applies and whether your evidence is ready before you pay, our MARA-registered advisers can give you that in writing.

What an Australian partner visa actually costs, beyond the application charge