How many kangaroos are there in Australia?

It’s difficult to give an accurate estimate of how many kangaroos there are in Australia. But pulling kangaroo numbers together from various sources, it’s likely that the Australian kangaroo population is around 50 million.

Australia is famous for its kangaroos, but just how many kangaroos are there in Australia? Well, unfortunately, there are so many kangaroos in Australia that getting reliable kangaroo population figures is a bit tricky.

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One source of kangaroo numbers is the Australian Government’s Department of Agriculture, Water and the Environment. This department keeps kangaroo population statistics as part of regulating wild kangaroo harvests. Put bluntly, lots of wild kangaroos get shot for meat or fur every year. But the euphemistically-named harvesting quotas are based on the estimated population.

Australian kangaroo population statistics

Figures are published as a PDF on the Department website. The latest Australian kangaroo population figures are for 2020, based on surveys conducted in 2019. According to these surveys there are 42,756,617 kangaroos in Australia.

Tick off 9 Australian bucket list experiences

Take Blue Mountains day tour from Sydney – with kangaroo-feeding at a wildlife park, Scenic World tickets and a Parramatta River cruise.
Snorkel or dive on the Great Barrier Reef from Cairns.
Do Australia’s most spectacular drive on a Great Ocean Road day tour from Melbourne.
Drive along the beach on a 4WD day tour of Fraser Island, the world’s biggest sand island.
Have a dune-top barbecue dinner and stargazing session in the shadow of Uluru.
See penguins on Phillip Island – and more native wildlife at the Moonlit Sanctuary – on a day trip from Melbourne.
Go snorkelling, sandboarding and kayaking on Moreton Island from Brisbane.
Meet gloriously cute quokkas on Rottnest Island near Perth with a ferry and bike hire package.
Kayak with dolphins in Byron Bay.

However, this figure is only for the areas of New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. The other states and areas where kangaroos aren’t harvested aren’t counted. Species such as tammar wallabies and euros, which aren’t strictly kangaroos, are also included within the Australian kangaroo population figure.

kangaroos on the Horizons Golf Resort golf course in Salamander Bay, Port Stephens, NSW — Kangaroos on the fairway at the Horizons Golf Resort in Salamander Bay, NSW. Photo courtesy of Destination NSW.

Number of kangaroos in Australia by state

We can attempt to round out the kangaroo numbers by looking at the other states individually, however. According to the Victorian Government’s Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, there were around 1,942,000 kangaroos in Victoria in 2020.

The AWE, meanwhile, reckons there are around 26,000 Forester kangaroos in Tasmania. Forester kangaroos are a sub-species of the predominant eastern grey kangaroos, and is the species that lives in Tasmania.

Australian kangaroo population: 50 million kangaroos in Australia?

There are no reliable estimates for the number of kangaroos in the Northern Territory, where harvesting does not take place. Given that a lot of the big red kangaroos inhabit the Northern Territory outback, this makes putting an overall kangaroo population figure together very difficult. But from the various, incomplete sources we do have, it’s reasonable to estimate that around 50 million kangaroos live in Australia.

Good places to see kangaroos in Australia include the Anglesea Golf Course on the Great Ocean Road, the Alice Springs Kangaroo Sanctuary and the Euroka Campground in the Blue Mountains.

Kangaroos can travel at speeds of up to 55km/h.