A guide to the age of consent in Australia

Updated 29 January 2026

This article was reviewed by Teach Us Consent.

The legal age for consenting to sexual activity is 16 in most of Australia (NSW, VIC, QLD, WA, NT, ACT) and 17 in SA and TAS.
If one person involved is in a position of authority (e.g. a teacher or a boss), the age of consent is usually 18.
The legal age for sharing digital sexual content (nudes/videos) is 18 nationwide.

Age of consent is the age at which the law considers you old enough to freely agree to sexual activity, including touching, oral sex and penetration. Any sexual contact with someone who is under the age of consent is a crime, even if they said yes.

True consent means making an active choice without being forced, threatened or talked into it, and it reflects your capacity to fully understand what you’re agreeing to. Check out our guide to what you need to know about consent.

Age of consent laws are designed to support young people to make informed choices about who they’re intimate with, and to protect them from being pressured or influenced by older people and adults. The law recognises that differences in age, experience or authority can influence a person’s ability to freely and confidently give consent.

No, it varies depending on which state or territory you’re in at the time.

In NSW, VIC, QLD, WA, NT and the ACT, it's 16 years old.
In SA or TAS, it's 17 years old.

Yes. The law recognises that power dynamics play a massive role in consent. When one person has authority over another, it creates a power gap that makes it much harder for the younger person to say no, or even to know if they truly want to say yes.

Because of this, the age of consent usually increases to 18 if the other person is in a position of trust or authority. This includes:

teachers, tutors, sports coaches and bosses
doctors, social workers and police officers.

Because these people can influence your grades, your job or your wellbeing, the law makes it their responsibility to maintain strict boundaries.

What if we’re close in age?

The law focuses on preventing exploitation by adults, not punishing relationships between peers. Exceptions may be made for people who are at a similar life stage. For example, if both people are between 14 and 16 years old and are no more than two years apart in age (e.g. two 15-year-olds), consent may be allowed under the law.

These rules vary by state, so check Youth Law Australia for the laws that apply where you live.

While the age of consent for physical sex is either 16 or 17, depending on where you live, it’s illegal for anyone (including you) to create, possess or share explicit images or videos of someone under age 18.

This also applies to AI-generated or ‘deepfake’ images and videos. Generating or sharing a sexually explicit AI image of someone is a form of sexual harassment, and if the subject is under 18, it’s treated as child sexual abuse material, regardless of whether or not it’s ‘real’. To report material like this, use the eSafety Commissioner’s reporting tool.

Learn more about what to do if someone leaks your nudes.

An age gap isn’t always a problem, but being involved in sexual activity with someone who is in a later life stage than you can make it hard to feel like an equal partner, even if everyone means well.

You might feel pressure to:

try things you aren't ready for, to seem ‘mature’
go along with things because the older person is paying for everything
follow their lead because they have more ‘experience’.

If you’re unsure about whether there’s an imbalance, it can be helpful to ask yourself: ‘If we disagree, does my voice feel like it matters as much as theirs?’

While these imbalances often happen unintentionally, they are different from grooming (a deliberate process used to build a false sense of trust) or coercive control (a pattern of behaviour used to dominate or ‘trap’ a partner). If you feel your partner is isolating you, monitoring your movements or making you feel it’s unsafe to say no, reach out to a trusted friend or to one of the support services listed below.

Where can I go for help?

Youth Law Australia provides free legal info for under-25s.
1800RESPECT (1800 737 732) provides 24/7 phone and online support around consent and relationships.
Teach Us Consent has a variety of resources about consent, unpacking topics like power dynamics in age-gap relationships and the influence of gender expectations on consent.