Daily tobacco smoking among Australians aged 14 and above fell to 5.6% in 2025, according to the AIHW National Drug Strategy Household Survey The Guardian. That is a sharp drop from 8.3% in the 2022–23 survey period. It also puts Australia well ahead of the federal government's National Tobacco Strategy 2023–2030, which aimed for under 10% prevalence by 2025 and set a further goal of 5% or less by 2030.

The survey ran from June to December 2025 and collected responses from more than 17,500 people aged 14 and over, making it the largest nationally representative survey on tobacco use in the country The Guardian. The previous iteration, in 2022–23, had over 21,000 participants AIHW.

Overall nicotine use has declined as well. The share of Australians using any nicotine fell to 15.2% in 2025, down from 17.4% in 2022–23 The Guardian. Vaping rates, meanwhile, have stabilised according to the same data.

Cancer Council Australia CEO Jacinta Reddan noted that more than two-thirds of Australians aged 14 and above had never smoked, a historic high The Guardian. The broader context here is a generational shift away from smoking uptake. Earlier AIHW data showed steep declines among young adults: the daily smoking rate for males aged 18–24 fell from 24.5% to 6.9%, and for females in the same group from 23.5% to 5.0% AIHW.

Yet the headline gains sit alongside a rapidly expanding illicit tobacco market. Thirty-four percent of smokers reported recently using illicit tobacco in 2025, more than double the 16.7% recorded in 2022–23 The Guardian. Twenty-two percent of smokers said they had purchased branded illicit tobacco, meaning products sold without the plain packaging and graphic health warnings required under Australian law, in the previous three months. Of those buyers, 57% said they bought it from a licensed tobacconist.

The illicit market dynamic complicates the relationship between excise-driven demand reduction (using high tobacco taxes to push smokers to quit) and regulatory enforcement. Australia's plain packaging laws are among the strictest in the world, but they depend on compliance at the point of sale. The fact that a majority of illicit purchases are happening through licensed tobacconists points to an enforcement gap within regulated retail channels rather than a purely underground or shadow economy.

The equity dimension also matters. Australians with a mental health condition were twice as likely to smoke daily in 2022–23 as those without such a diagnosis or treatment AIHW. Australians with disability reported higher current daily smoking (14% compared with 8.7%) and higher lifetime smoking (51% compared with 37%) AIHW. These disparities suggest the aggregate decline may not be evenly distributed across population groups.

The AIHW hosts an official data-collection page for the 2025 National Drug Strategy Household Survey AIHW. The 2022–2023 iteration included a dedicated section on tobacco and e-cigarettes and vapes AIHW.

Based on the 2025 figure of 5.6%, Australia's path toward the 2030 target of 5% daily smoking prevalence looks achievable. Whether the remaining gap can be closed, though, depends on addressing both the illicit supply chain and the persistent prevalence gaps among vulnerable populations. The stabilisation of vaping rates adds another variable to the nicotine landscape, though its net effect on long-term quitting patterns remains an open empirical question.