Gold Coast population: how many people live on the Gold Coast?

The Gold Coast - Tweed Heads Significant Urban Area had an estimated resident population of 761,634 at 30 June 2025. That made it the sixth-largest urban area by population, and the largest that does not contain a capital city. Only the urban areas of Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane, Perth and Adelaide had larger populations, and the urban area accounted for 2.8 per cent of Australia's 27,613,654 people¹. The boundary crosses the Queensland and New South Wales border, grouping the Gold Coast with the connected Tweed Heads area, and the ABS lists it under Queensland.

The ABS updates the estimate once a year, at 30 June. In this release, the estimates are final for 2001 to 2021, revised for 2022 to 2024 and preliminary for 2025². The next release, covering 30 June 2026, is due on 25 March 2027³.

In 2024-25, net overseas migration added 8,986 people to the City of Gold Coast, the largest of the three components of population change⁴. The ABS publishes population-change components for council areas rather than the Gold Coast - Tweed Heads urban area, so this article uses the two council boundaries.

Natural increase (the excess of births over deaths) added 2,300 people to the City of Gold Coast. Net internal migration (moves to and from elsewhere in Australia) added 658. The three components totalled an increase of 11,944 people, a growth rate of 1.76 per cent⁴.

The pattern differed in the Tweed council area, on the New South Wales side of the border. Net internal migration was its largest component, at 427 people, followed by net overseas migration at 420. Deaths exceeded births, resulting in a natural decrease of 131 people. Overall, the population increased by 716 people or 0.71 per cent⁴.

The net internal migration figure for the City of Gold Coast is the balance of much larger flows in both directions. During 2024-25, 29,500 people moved to the council area from elsewhere in Australia and 28,842 moved out⁵. Together, the two council areas added 12,660 people over the year, compared with 12,279 in the urban area. The figures cover different boundaries and are not directly comparable⁴.

Gold Coast - Tweed Heads was Queensland's second largest urban area at 30 June 2025, behind Brisbane. Brisbane had 2,745,086 people, ahead of Gold Coast - Tweed Heads at 761,634, the Sunshine Coast at 424,741, Townsville at 190,551, Cairns at 164,149 and Toowoomba at 153,781¹. Gold Coast - Tweed Heads had more people than the Sunshine Coast and Townsville combined, whose totals sum to 615,292.

The urban area was larger than the Sunshine Coast in every year from 2001 to 2025, and the gap widened from 201,122 people at 30 June 2001 to 336,893 at 30 June 2025¹.

Growth in 2024-25 was faster elsewhere in Queensland's south east: 2.08 per cent in Brisbane and 1.92 per cent on the Sunshine Coast, against 1.64 per cent for Gold Coast - Tweed Heads. Toowoomba grew 1.28 per cent, Townsville 0.93 per cent and Cairns 0.86 per cent¹. Across the state, Greater Brisbane added 58,223 people (2.10 per cent) over the year and the rest of Queensland added 39,651 (1.42 per cent)⁷.

Brisbane's population trends are covered in the Brisbane population article.

The urban area added 330,918 people between 30 June 2001 and 30 June 2025, growing from 430,716 to 761,634. The 2025 population was 1.77 times its 30 June 2001 population¹.

Gold Coast - Tweed Heads first exceeded 500,000 at 30 June 2006, 550,000 at 30 June 2009, 600,000 at 30 June 2013, 650,000 at 30 June 2017, 700,000 at 30 June 2021 and 750,000 at 30 June 2025¹. Each of the five steps between these milestones took three or four years.

The City of Gold Coast council area grew from 379,679 people at 30 June 2001 to 691,230 at 30 June 2025, 1.82 times its 2001 population. The Tweed council area passed 100,000 residents for the first time at 30 June 2024, reaching 100,328, and held 101,044 a year later, up from 73,980 at 30 June 2001¹.