Compare with 2016
Swipe against SEIFA 2016
Drag the divider to wipe between 2016 and 2021. Both sides are drawn on rank
position, never raw scores, because the index is rebuilt each Census.
What SEIFA is
SEIFA stands for Socio-Economic Indexes for Areas. It is a set of four indexes built by the Australian Bureau of Statistics from Census answers. Each index summarises a different group of Census variables and ranks areas against each other.
- IRSAD — advantage and disadvantage together.
- IRSD — disadvantage only.
- IEO — qualifications held and skill level of jobs.
- IER — income, housing costs and dwelling size.
Reading the numbers
Scores are standardised so the average area sits at 1000, with a standard deviation of 100. Lower always means more disadvantage. Deciles and percentiles rank an area against all other areas, either across Australia or within its own state.
The indexes describe areas, not people. A low-scoring area still contains well-off households, and a high-scoring area still contains struggling ones. Some areas have no score, usually because too few people live there.
Comparing across years
The variables and weightings change with each Census, so a score of 900 in one year does not mean the same thing as a score of 900 in another. The ABS advises that if you compare across years, use deciles or percentiles rather than scores or ranks.
This map
SEIFA 2021, from the 2021 Census, released 27 April 2023. Boundaries are ASGS Edition 3. Everything is queried live from ABS web services each time you pan or zoom. Nothing is stored, cached between sessions, or altered.
Next release
SEIFA is rebuilt after each Census. Census night for the 2026 Census was 11 August 2026, with first Census results expected from 2027. SEIFA 2021 followed its Census by about 20 months, so a 2026 edition would land around 2028. The ABS has not published a date.
Sources
Independence
This is an independent tool. It is not made, published, endorsed or checked by the ABS, and the ABS has no involvement in it. The underlying data is ABS material used under CC BY 4.0. For anything official, go to the ABS sources above.