Australia’s life expectancy is increasing with Sydney’s North Shore and Hornsby having the longest

While all Australians are living longer than ever, new data reveals there is a big disparity between those in regional areas and cities.

New data from the Australia Bureau of Statistics found those living in capital cities had better life expectancies than their regional counterparts in every single state and territory. 

Those with the longest life expectancy in Australia live in Sydney’s northern suburbs of North Sydney and Hornsby – with men having an average life expectancy of 85.4  and women 87.8 years. 

Meanwhile, men and women in the Northern Territory’s Outback region have the lowest life expectancy of 72.2 for men and 76.6 for women – which is 11 years less than those in Sydney’s north. 

In NSW, North Sydney and Hornsby had the longest overall life expectancy (86.6 years), Baulkham Hills and Hawkesbury was second (86.1 years) and Ryde was third (86 years). 

The area with the longest life expectancy in Victoria was Melbourne’s inner east, which had an average lifespan of 86.2 years. 

Brisbane’s West had the longest life expectancy in Queensland, with people living to 85.6 years old on average. 

Meanwhile in Western Australia, inner Perth had the longest life expectancy, with 85.1 years old being the average. 

Australians in Adelaide’s central and hills district live an average of 84.1 years, making it the area with the longest life expectancy in South Australia. 

In the ACT, people live to an average of 83.5 years old. There is only one statistical area so no internal comparisons can be made. 

In Tasmania, those in Hobart live the longest – 82 years – while in the NT, citizens of Darwin live slightly longer to 82.2.     

Among states and territories, Victoria recorded the longest male life expectancy of (81.8 years) while the ACT recorded the longest female life expectancy (85.6 years). 

The Northern Territory recorded the lowest life expectancy for men and women (75.5 years and 80.6 years) but made the largest gains over the last decade (2.2 years and 1.6 years).  

Overall, Australians are living longer than they ever have before. The life expectancy at birth was 80.9 years for males and 85.0 years for females in 2017-19. 

‘Male life expectancy has increased by 0.2 years since 2016-2018, and by 1.6 years in the past ten years,’ ABS Demography Director Lauren Ford said.

‘Female life expectancy has increased by 0.1 years since 2016-2018, and by 1.1 years in the past decade.’ 

While females historically live longer than males, men are starting to close the gap as the life expectancy for males is improving at a faster rate than women. 

In 1988, the males had a life expectancy of 73.1 years and females had an expectancy of 79.5 years – a gap of 6.4 years. 

The gap has now narrowed to 4.1 years in 2017-2019.

‘Australians have a higher life expectancy than comparable countries, such as New Zealand, the United Kingdom and the USA,’ Ms Ford said.

While the male life expectancy is 80.9 years for Australian males, Kiwi men are expected to live 80 years, British men live to 79.4 and American males live to 76. 

Australian women live to 85 years on average, while NZ women live to 83.5 years old, women in the UK live to 83.1 years old and US women live to 81 years old. 

Singapore has the longest life expectancy at birth for males in the world at 81.4 years old while Japan has the longest for women at 87.1 years old. 

Overall, Japan has the longest life expectancy for men and women combined at 84.47 years old.