What is the Australian student visa 500 and how do you apply?

Direct answer: The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) describes it as a temporary visa "to study up to 6 years", where "the type of course and its length will determine the length of stay". You must hold a valid Confirmation of Enrolment (CoE) and Overseas Student Health Cover (OSHC) when the decision is made.

The order of steps matters. Study Australia (n.d.) states that you "will need to enrol in a course at an Australian education or training provider first and then apply for a student visa after you have been issued a confirmation of enrolment (CoE) from the provider." The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) adds that a CoE "is no longer valid if it is cancelled or the course is complete", so a change of course after the grant needs attention. Health cover has its own timing rule: the Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) says that cover "must start from the day you and your family arrive in Australia, not the day your course starts." A student who books flights two weeks before orientation therefore needs cover from the arrival date, not from the first lecture.

Direct answer: Study Australia (2026) reports that the Student visa application charge rose from AUD 2,000 to AUD 2,500 on 1 July 2026. Primary applicants with a passport from an ASEAN country, including Vietnam, continue to pay the earlier charge plus an annual CPI adjustment, so check the exact figure in the Home Affairs pricing estimator.

The concession is easy to miss in news coverage that quotes only the headline figure of AUD 2,500 and forgets the earlier AUD 2,000. Study Australia (2026) lists Vietnam among the ASEAN countries whose primary Student visa applicants "will continue to pay the current application charge, plus an annual Consumer Price Index (CPI) adjustment". The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) confirms that "a lower visa cost applies to eligible Pacific Island and Timor-Leste citizens, eligible ASEAN citizens" and that "there is also a charge for each family member who applies for the visa." The charge is not the whole cost. The same page warns that you might also pay for health checks, police certificates and biometrics, so budget for those before you count the visa as paid.

Direct answer: The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) allows up to 48 hours a fortnight while your course is in session, and unlimited hours when your course is not in session. Students in a master's by research or a doctoral degree, and their families, have no work limit.

The 48-hour figure is a fortnightly total, not a weekly cap of 24 hours, so a student can work 30 hours one week and 18 the next. The work condition is a legal condition of the visa rather than advice. Wilson et al. (2023), surveying international students renting in Sydney and Melbourne in 2019, found that high financial stress led to evictions and poorer wellbeing, and that access to paid work did not protect students from it, which is one reason the hour limit and the funds requirement deserve to be planned together rather than treated as separate boxes on a form. If your timetable is heavy in one semester, the safer plan is to budget for fewer paid hours in that period and more in the break.

Direct answer: You must show enough money for travel, 12 months of living costs, tuition for you and any accompanying family, and school costs for school-aged dependants (Department of Home Affairs, n.d.-c). The living-cost figure is a minimum, and the current amount is shown in the Home Affairs document checklist.

The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) is direct about what the declared amount means: it is "the minimum amount of money you need for the visa. Actual living costs vary throughout Australia." Treat the official figure as the floor for the visa and your own city budget as the real plan. Read the current amount on the official checklist on the day you apply, because the figure is updated and copies on agency websites go out of date.

Direct answer: The Genuine Student (GS) requirement applies to applications lodged on or after 23 March 2024 and replaced the Genuine Temporary Entrant test (Department of Home Affairs, n.d.-b). You answer set questions about your study plans, each in English and limited to 150 words.

The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-b) explains that it gives "more weight to statements supported by evidence", so each answer should point to a document: a transcript, an employer letter, a course outline. The same page says that an interest in later migration is not held against you: "Future intentions of this kind do not count against an applicant under GS." What the answers must show is why this course, at this provider, fits your past study and your next step. MAAS advisors help you plan how your study history connects to the course you choose, while you write and submit every visa answer yourself, as described under study abroad and SOP consulting.

Direct answer: From 2 October 2026, most Student visa applications must be lodged outside Australia, and family can never join later as subsequent entrants (Department of Home Affairs, n.d.-a). Vietnamese and other ASEAN or Pacific applicants outside Australia can still include family when they lodge. Earlier applications follow the old rules.

The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) states that "most Student visa applications must be lodged outside Australia" and that you can apply in Australia only "if you hold an eligible visa and meet an exemption category". The exemptions include needing up to 12 additional months to complete your studies and applying to undertake a PhD. On family, the page is firm: family members "cannot apply as a subsequent entrant (at a later time, separate from your application) in any circumstance." Most applicants also can no longer include family members, but the same page lists exemptions, and one covers eligible nationals of Pacific Island and ASEAN countries, Vietnam among them: if you are outside Australia, you can include family members when you lodge your application (Department of Home Affairs, n.d.-a). Because nobody can be added later, a Vietnamese applicant planning to bring a partner should include them at lodgement and check the current page first.

Direct answer: Not from inside Australia. The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-a) lists the Temporary Graduate visa (subclass 485) among visas whose holders "cannot apply for a student visa in Australia", adding that "there are no exemptions to this rule". A 485 holder who wants to study again must apply from outside Australia.

The same list includes Visitor (subclass 600), eVisitor (subclass 651) and Electronic Travel Authority (subclass 601) holders. That closes the route of arriving as a tourist and converting to a student visa. For a graduate whose 485 is ending, the practical consequence is timing: leave room in the plan to lodge from home, wait for a decision and return before the new course starts. Our guide to the PhD in Australia covers the PhD route. Applying for a PhD is one of the onshore exemptions, but it is open only to holders of an eligible visa, which does not include the 485.

Direct answer: Home Affairs does not publish a fixed time on the visa page. It points applicants to its processing time guide tool, which shows recent decisions and "is a guide only and not specific to your application" (Department of Home Affairs, n.d.-a). For applications lodged outside Australia, priority depends partly on your provider under Ministerial Direction 115.

Ministerial Direction 115 applies to applications lodged outside Australia on or after 14 November 2025 (Department of Home Affairs, n.d.-d). It ranks applications partly by how many new students each provider has already brought in that year. The direction says: "Delegates must accord Priority 2 to offshore Subclass 500 (Student) applications associated with providers in the higher education and vocational education and training sectors where the prioritisation threshold for a particular provider for a particular year has been reached, but where the upper threshold has not been reached, based on PRISMS information" (Department of Home Affairs, 2025, p. 6). The Department of Home Affairs (n.d.-d) also stresses that "a Ministerial Direction is not a visa cap". In practice, the same complete file can wait longer at one provider than at another, so apply early.