Abbreviated as LANP; referenced by 1 other explainer
Language used at home shows the main language each resident speaks at home. English only comes first. The top other languages come after it.
The figures come from Census data. The Australian Bureau of Statistics collects them.
ABS gives a separate Not stated count for language used at home. So this marker shows a Language not stated row next to the language rows.
The Census asks for the main language each person speaks at home. Many people speak more than one. The Census keeps only the main one. So a family that speaks Mandarin and some English sits under Mandarin, not English only.
ABS groups some languages into residual clusters: Other Chinese languages, Other Indo-Aryan languages, and Other Southeast Asian languages. Each cluster holds dozens of languages.
The Census also reports Australian Indigenous languages as one grouping. These are the languages of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. This page keeps the ABS grouping. It does not split them into single languages. So distinct First Nations languages are not shown on their own here. For Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander language planning, read these counts as a guide only. Read them with the First Nations marker. Check them with community-controlled groups too. At the default top view, this grouping often falls into All other categories. Filter to it on its own to see it.
This page does not show how well a person speaks English. The Census asks that on its own. A future marker may show it. For now, read each row as what a person speaks at home. It is not a stand-in for English need.
Languages outside the top group are summed into an All other categories total, so every person is still counted.
The total counts people at their place of usual residence. It covers people in homes such as hospitals, aged-care homes, hostels, and student housing. It leaves out people just visiting from overseas.
ABS tweaks small-area counts to keep people safe, which can hide small cells. This is called perturbation.
Place Forecast splits each SA1 figure down to mesh blocks and sums them back to the area you see, so the small-area view is downscaled. The cultural diversity downscaling glossary explains the method and its limits.
Each language at the LGA level matches the ABS figure. This is LGA anchoring.
For service choices about one language group, read small-area figures as patterns, not exact counts. Validate against on-the-ground knowledge from community organisations before drawing conclusions.