Partner Visa Basics: Sponsoring or Being Sponsored After Studying in Australia

A partner visa lets the spouse or de facto partner of an Australian citizen, Australian permanent resident or eligible New Zealand citizen live in Australia. If you are onshore (in Australia, often on a student visa), you apply for the temporary Subclass 820 and permanent Subclass 801 together as one combined application. If you are offshore, you apply for the temporary Subclass 309 and permanent Subclass 100 together. Not yet married? The Subclass 300 Prospective Marriage visa is the pathway that leads into 820/801 after your wedding.

The Five Partner Visa Subclasses at a Glance

“Partner visa” is not one visa. It is a family of five subclasses that pair up into two pathways depending on where you are when you apply, plus one visa for couples who are not yet married. Here is how Home Affairs itself groups them.

Two things about that table are easy to miss. First, you never apply for the temporary and permanent stages separately – one application and one payment covers both (820+801, or 309+100). Second, the fee for the temporary stage is the fee for the whole journey; Home Affairs’ own Subclass 801 and Subclass 100 pages both say plainly that you already paid when you lodged the combined application, so there is no second visa application charge waiting for you two years later. Once you hold the permanent 801 or 100 visa, you can live, work and study in Australia indefinitely, sponsor eligible family members yourself, and – once you meet the residence requirement – apply for Australian citizenship. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, Subclass 820, 801, 309 and 100 visa pages, checked 24 August 2026.

Onshore or Offshore: Which Pathway Applies to You

The single biggest fork in the process is where you physically are when you lodge. This is not a preference you choose for convenience – Home Affairs sets it as a hard eligibility rule for each subclass.

Onshore: Subclass 820 then 801

If you are in Australia – for example, finishing a degree on a student visa – and your spouse or de facto partner is an Australian citizen, permanent resident or eligible New Zealand citizen, you apply for the Subclass 820/801 combination. Home Affairs requires you (and any family members applying with you) to be in Australia at the time you lodge. Once you have applied, you can be in or outside Australia while the temporary 820 stage is decided. While the 820 is active, you can live, work and study in Australia, travel to and from the country as many times as you want, and in most cases access Medicare. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, Subclass 820 (temporary), checked 24 August 2026.

Offshore: Subclass 309 then 100

If you are outside Australia when you lodge, you apply for the Subclass 309/100 combination instead. The eligibility requirements mirror the onshore pathway – genuine relationship, an eligible sponsor – but you must be outside Australia at the point of application. This is the pathway that applies if, for instance, your student visa has already expired and you have returned to your home country, or if you met your partner while they were living or working overseas.

The Prospective Marriage Visa (Subclass 300): If You Are Not Yet Married

If you are engaged but not yet married, and your relationship has not reached the de facto threshold either, the Prospective Marriage visa (Subclass 300) is the visa built for you. It is sometimes called a “fiance visa,” although Home Affairs does not use that term.

To be eligible for the 300 visa, Home Affairs’ own eligibility page sets out that you must: be 18 years old or older; have a sponsor who is an Australian citizen, permanent resident or eligible New Zealand citizen; intend to marry your prospective spouse before the visa period ends; have met your prospective spouse in person, as adults, since you both turned 18, and be known to each other personally at the time you apply; and be outside Australia (along with any family applying with you) when you apply. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, Subclass 300, checked 24 August 2026.

Once granted, a Subclass 300 visa lasts 9 to 15 months from the date it is granted, and you can work and study in Australia during that time. The catch is the deadline: you must actually marry your sponsor before the visa period ends, and then lodge your Subclass 820/801 application (you will now be onshore, so the domestic pathway applies) before the 300 visa expires. If the wedding does not happen in time, the pathway to a partner visa through this route closes and you would need to look at your situation again from scratch – which is exactly the kind of fact pattern worth taking to a registered migration agent rather than guessing.

One detail that trips people up: because the 300 visa is specifically for couples who are not yet married, if your relationship is already a genuine de facto relationship (see the de facto section below) you may be eligible to skip the 300 visa entirely and apply for 820/801 or 309/100 directly, marriage certificate or not.

Who Can Sponsor You (and the Character Checks Sponsors Now Face)

Every partner visa needs a sponsor – the Australian citizen, Australian permanent resident or eligible New Zealand citizen you are married to or in a de facto relationship with. Sponsorship is a separate legal undertaking from the visa application itself, and Home Affairs has tightened what it expects from sponsors in recent years.

To sponsor a Partner or Prospective Marriage visa applicant, the sponsor must provide both an Australian police check and a foreign police check (covering countries where they have lived) as part of the sponsorship application, and must give written consent for Home Affairs to disclose any convictions for “relevant offences” to the visa applicant. If the sponsor has a conviction for a relevant offence and a significant criminal record, the law requires the visa to be refused unless Home Affairs is satisfied, considering all the circumstances, that it is reasonable not to refuse it. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, sponsor requirements for Partner and Prospective Marriage visas, checked 24 August 2026.

Sponsorship also has limits that exist independently of the relationship itself: broadly, there are restrictions on how many times someone can sponsor a partner and on sponsoring again too soon after a previous partner sponsorship. These limitation rules are genuinely case-specific (they interact with things like how long ago a previous sponsorship was approved), so if you or your sponsor has sponsored a partner before, confirm your position with Home Affairs or a migration agent before you rely on being eligible to sponsor again.

Does Home Affairs Count Your Relationship as "De Facto"?

If you are not married, your relationship needs to meet the legal definition of a de facto relationship under the Migration Regulations 1994 – and this is where a lot of international student couples get caught out on timing.

Under regulation 1.09A, a de facto relationship exists between two people, of any gender, who are not married to each other but who have a mutual commitment to a shared life together to the exclusion of all others, whose relationship is genuine and continuing, and who live together (or do not live separately and apart on a permanent basis). Home Affairs weighs this using the same broad categories the Regulations point to: the financial aspects of your relationship (joint accounts, shared bills, financial support), the nature of your household (do you live together, whose name is on the lease), the social aspects (do family and friends know you as a couple, do you present publicly as partners), and the nature of your commitment to each other (how long-term the relationship is intended to be). Source: Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth), reg 1.09A.

The 12-Month Rule (and Its Two Exceptions)

Regulation 2.03A requires the de facto relationship to have existed for at least 12 months immediately before you lodge your application, unless one of two exceptions applies: your relationship is formally registered on an Australian state or territory relationships register, or there are compelling and compassionate circumstances for granting the visa despite the shorter relationship. Source: Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth), reg 2.03A.

For international students, this rule matters in a very practical way: if your relationship has not reached 12 months and it is not registered, you are not automatically shut out, but you are relying on Home Affairs accepting compelling and compassionate circumstances – a genuinely higher bar, assessed case by case, not a formality. If you are close to marrying instead, or your relationship is close to the 12-month mark, the timing of when you lodge can matter more than it first appears. This is a scenario worth mapping out with a registered migration agent rather than guessing at how “compelling and compassionate” will be read in your case.

What Counts as Evidence of a Genuine Relationship

Whichever subclass you apply for, you need to prove your relationship is genuine, not just legally defined. Home Affairs’ own evidence guidance groups acceptable documents by relationship type and expects you to build a file, not hand over one certificate.

For a spouse (married) relationship, the core document is your marriage certificate. For a de facto relationship, Home Affairs points to documents like a joint financial statement, a joint utilities notice (power, gas, internet in both names), a joint tenancy agreement, and a joint mortgage agreement – in other words, paperwork that already exists because you genuinely share a life, not documents created specifically for the visa. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, evidence of spouse or de facto partner relationship, checked 24 August 2026.

In practice, case officers are assessing the same four areas the de facto definition itself is built on: financial (shared bank accounts, bills split or paid by one partner for both, joint debts), household (a lease or mortgage with both names, shared address history, who does the housework), social (photos, wedding or engagement announcements, statements from family and friends, joint invitations), and commitment (how you refer to each other, shared future plans, wills or insurance naming each other). No single document decides your case; a consistent pattern across all four areas is what a genuine relationship claim is built on.

Moving From a Student Visa to a Partner Visa: What Actually Changes

This is the scenario this guide is really written for: you are in Australia on a student visa, you are in a genuine relationship with an Australian citizen, permanent resident or eligible New Zealand citizen, and you are weighing up applying for a partner visa before your student visa runs out.

The mechanism that carries you across is the Bridging Visa A (BVA). When you lodge a valid onshore Subclass 820/801 application while you still hold a current student visa, you are automatically granted a BVA – no separate application, no extra cost. It does not activate immediately; you stay on your student visa’s conditions until that visa actually ceases (typically at its expiry date), and only then does the BVA take over so you remain lawfully in Australia while the 820 is processed.

The detail that catches people out is travel. A Bridging Visa A does not let you leave and re-enter Australia – if you depart on a BVA, it ceases, and you would need to have already been granted a Bridging Visa B (a separate, paid application) before travelling. If a family emergency, a wedding overseas, or simply wanting to visit home is realistically part of your plans while your 820 is processing, that needs to be arranged in advance, not assumed. For the full mechanics of how bridging visas work – including work rights, which depend on your bridging visa’s specific conditions rather than a blanket rule – see our dedicated guide, Bridging Visas for Students in Australia: What They Actually Do.

One planning point worth flagging honestly: lodging a partner visa application does not extend your student visa or change your course enrolment obligations up to the point your student visa ceases. If you are close to finishing your course, you and your partner (and, if relevant, a migration agent) may want to map out the sequencing – course completion date, student visa expiry, and when to lodge the partner visa application – rather than leaving it until the last month.

What a Partner Visa Actually Costs

As of 24 August 2026, Home Affairs lists the combined Subclass 820/801 charge as from AUD 11,710 for most main applicants, and the Subclass 309/100 combination at the same base rate. If you already hold or have held a Subclass 300 Prospective Marriage visa and are now applying for 820/801, the base charge drops to from AUD 1,955 – a real saving built into the system for couples who came through the marriage-visa route first. Limited concessions apply in other circumstances, and from 1 July 2026 a lower cost applies to eligible Pacific Island and Timor-Leste citizens. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, Subclass 820 (temporary) visa page, checked 24 August 2026.

Two things worth being precise about, because they are easy to get wrong from older or third-party sources. First, this is the base charge for the main applicant only – additional charges apply for a partner or dependent children included on the same application, and the exact figure depends on the date your application is received. Second, Home Affairs’ own Subclass 801 and Subclass 100 pages state plainly that you already paid for the permanent stage when you lodged the combined temporary-and-permanent application – there is no second, separate visa application charge waiting for you when the permanent stage is assessed roughly two years later. To get a figure specific to your situation – your pathway, your location, and any additional applicants – use the official Visa Pricing Estimator on the Home Affairs website rather than relying on a fixed number from any guide, including this one.

How Long a Partner Visa Takes to Process

Home Affairs is unusually direct about this on its own website: partner visa applicants “may experience longer processing times than expected.” Applications are processed according to Ministerial Direction 117 (family visa processing priorities), and Home Affairs publishes a processing time guide tool that shows how long recently decided applications actually took – useful as a guide, but explicitly not a promise for your specific case. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, Partner Visa Frequently Asked Questions, checked 24 August 2026.

What is fixed, rather than variable, is when the permanent stage becomes eligible for assessment: two years after you lodged the combined temporary-and-permanent application. Home Affairs cannot assess your 801 or 100 visa before that two-year mark regardless of how quickly your file moves, because the law requires evidence that the relationship is still genuine and continuing at that later point, not just at the time you first applied. In practice this means the earliest you should expect a permanent outcome is around the two-year mark from lodgement, with many applications taking longer once you add the time to decide the temporary stage first.

Because processing times shift with application volumes and government priorities, treat any specific week or month figure you read anywhere – including in migration agency marketing – as a snapshot, not a guarantee. Check the live Home Affairs processing time guide close to when you actually apply.

What You Can Do While Your Partner Visa Is Being Processed

Holding a Subclass 820 or 309 while your permanent stage is assessed is not a waiting room with no rights. According to Home Affairs, with the temporary partner visa in effect you can: live, work and study in Australia (820) or in Australia once you have travelled there (309); travel to and from Australia as many times as you want (820 – the 309 requires you to be onshore to hold this stage in the first place, since it is typically granted after you have travelled to Australia on a different visa or once your application is finalised, so check your specific travel conditions); attend free English language classes through the Adult Migrant English Program if you are eligible; and apply for access to Medicare, Australia’s public health scheme. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, Subclass 820 (temporary), checked 24 August 2026.

If you came onto a Bridging Visa A because your student visa ceased before the 820 was decided, remember the BVA does not carry the same travel freedom as an active 820 – re-read the bridging visa section above before booking anything international.

Step by Step: What Happens After You Apply

Home Affairs actively encourages “decision ready” applications – meaning you provide all required documents, correct information, and English translations for anything non-English, at the point you lodge, rather than in response to later requests. A decision-ready file genuinely moves faster, because every follow-up request adds time on both sides. Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, “Check twice, submit once,” checked 24 August 2026.

• Health examinations. Do not book these before Home Affairs asks you to. Health examination results have a limited validity period, and completing them too early can mean redoing them (and paying again) if your case takes longer than expected to reach that stage.
• Police checks. Your sponsor must provide the required police checks when Home Affairs asks for them. Certificates issued in the 12 months before you apply are accepted, so if you already hold recent certificates from your own document-gathering, check the dates before assuming they are still valid by the time they are requested.
• Case officer contact. If Home Affairs needs more information or evidence, they will contact you (or your migration agent, if you have one) through ImmiAccount. Respond within the timeframe given – missing a deadline for requested documents can affect your application.
• The two-year mark. For the permanent stage (801 or 100), Home Affairs will typically get back in touch as you approach the two-year eligibility point to check the relationship is still genuine and ongoing, which may mean providing updated evidence rather than just what you submitted at lodgement.

Partner Visa or Skilled Migration: How This Pathway Compares

If you are an international student finishing your studies, a partner visa is not your only route to staying in Australia permanently – it just does not depend on your occupation, your skills assessment, or a state nomination the way the points-tested skilled migration pathways do. If you are weighing up your options, or your relationship situation is not yet settled enough to rely on, it is worth understanding both routes rather than assuming only one applies to you. Our overview of how international students get PR in Australia after graduating covers the points test, employer-sponsored visas and state nomination pathways side by side with the partner visa route.

The two are not mutually exclusive, either – some people hold a Temporary Graduate visa or a skilled visa pathway in progress while also being in a genuine relationship that could separately qualify for a partner visa. Which pathway suits you better depends on your occupation, your points position, and how settled your relationship is, which is exactly the kind of comparison a registered migration agent can help you weigh up rather than choosing based on which sounds faster.

If Your Relationship Ends While You Are Waiting

A partner visa is built around an ongoing relationship, so it is fair to ask what happens if that relationship does not survive the wait. Home Affairs sets out specific circumstances where your application can still continue even though the relationship with your sponsor has ended:

• your sponsoring partner has died
• you, or another family member included in the application, experienced domestic or family violence committed by the sponsoring partner
• you and the sponsoring partner have a child together and you share access and parental responsibility for that child

Source: immi.homeaffairs.gov.au, “About partner visas,” checked 24 August 2026. Outside of these specific circumstances, a relationship ending generally does affect your eligibility, since the visa is assessed on the relationship being genuine and continuing – which is exactly why the process asks you to notify Home Affairs if your relationship status changes.

Common Mistakes to Avoid

A few patterns show up repeatedly in how partner visa applications go wrong, none of which require anything unusual about your relationship – just planning around the process itself.

• Applying before you meet the 12-month de facto threshold, with no registered relationship and no genuinely compelling circumstances. This does not automatically fail, but it is a materially harder case to make. If you are close to 12 months, waiting can be the simpler path; if you cannot wait, get advice on whether your specific circumstances are likely to meet the “compelling and compassionate” bar before you lodge.
• Treating evidence as a box-ticking exercise instead of a consistent story. A handful of photos and one joint bill is thinner evidence than a smaller number of documents that consistently show the same shared life across the financial, household, social and commitment categories.
• Letting your student visa lapse without a plan for the bridging period. Know your Bridging Visa A conditions – especially the no-travel rule – before your student visa’s expiry date arrives, not after.
• Assuming your sponsor’s history will not come up. Sponsor police checks are now a standard part of the process. If your sponsor has a relevant criminal history, address it directly and early rather than hoping it goes unnoticed.
• Skipping the translation requirement, or using a non-accredited translator for documents produced in Australia. Missing or non-compliant translations are an easily avoidable cause of delay.
• Not telling Home Affairs when your circumstances change. A change of address, a change in relationship status, or a change to your contact details all need to be reported – not doing so can affect how your case is assessed.

Where to Get Real Help

Everything in this guide comes from primary sources – immi.homeaffairs.gov.au and the Migration Regulations 1994 – but a website guide cannot assess your specific facts, and migration law has genuine edge cases (previous visa refusals, character concerns, complex family situations, relationship timing) where the general rule and your outcome can diverge.

If you engage anyone to help with your application, check they are a MARA-registered migration agent (searchable on the Office of the Migration Agents Registration Authority website) or a practising Australian immigration lawyer. Only registered agents and lawyers can lawfully charge a fee for immigration assistance in Australia. Unregistered “consultants,” especially ones operating overseas and charging for guaranteed outcomes, are a genuine source of harm to applicants – no legitimate agent or lawyer can guarantee a visa will be granted, because the decision sits with Home Affairs, not with them.

For general questions about your own application, Home Affairs’ Partner Visa Frequently Asked Questions page is the first place to check, and ImmiAccount is where you lodge, track and update your application directly.

Frequently Asked Questions

Information last verified against immi.homeaffairs.gov.au and the Migration Regulations 1994 on 24 August 2026. Partner visa rules, fees and processing priorities change, sometimes without much notice – always confirm current details on the official Home Affairs website before you rely on them, and get advice from a MARA-registered migration agent for your specific situation.