190 Visa Processing Times by State: VIC, WA & SA Compared 2026

#How long does it take to get Australia subclass 190 visa after lodgement?

The Subclass 190 Skilled Nominated visa is a two-stage process. First, you receive a state or territory nomination. Second, you lodge your visa application with the Department of Home Affairs (DOHA). The processing clock starts only at the point of visa lodgement — not when you submit your Expression of Interest (EOI) or receive your nomination invitation. That distinction matters enormously when planning your timeline.

DOHA publishes indicative processing times on its website, but these are global averages across all states and all applicants. In practice, the state that nominated you, the volume of nominations that state has issued, and whether your application required additional checks (such as a Police Clearance Certificate refresh or a health re-assessment) all push the real-world timeline above or below the published figure.

#How long does a subclass 190 visa take to be granted in Australia?

DOHA currently reports a 75th percentile processing time of around 14 months for the 190, meaning three-quarters of applicants receive an outcome within that window. The 90th percentile extends beyond 20 months for complex cases or where health or character documents required re-submission.

A "straightforward" application in this context means: all health examinations completed before or shortly after lodgement, a valid police clearance from every country of residence, no gaps or inconsistencies in employment history, and a skills assessment that has not lapsed. Any one of these factors, if unresolved, can add weeks or months to your timeline.

#How long does it take to process an Australian 190 visa in 2025?

The 2025 financial year saw a notable tightening of nomination quotas across several states, particularly Victoria and New South Wales, which reduced the overall 190 lodgement volume. A smaller lodgement cohort typically translates to faster DOHA processing — but that benefit has been partially offset by DOHA's own internal resource constraints and the re-prioritisation of humanitarian and family stream applications following broader migration policy adjustments.

If you lodged a 190 application in the first half of 2025 with a complete document set, you are likely to have received or be close to receiving your grant by mid-2026. Applications lodged in late 2025 with outstanding health or police checks may still be in queue.

#How long does it take to get an Australian 190 state-sponsored visa?

It is important to separate the two phases:

#How long does it take to get an Australian 190 state nomination visa approved?

At VJ Consulting and Education, we track grant timelines across our client base and consistently find that the single biggest driver of faster approvals is application completeness at lodgement. Applicants who lodge with all health examinations finalised, current police clearances from every relevant country, and a certified skills assessment are processed significantly faster than those who lodge and then chase outstanding documents.

The second major driver is the occupation itself. Some occupations are assessed under a priority processing arrangement — particularly those on the Medium and Long-term Strategic Skills List (MLTSSL) — and case officers may allocate these files sooner. Check whether your nominated occupation carries any priority flag at the time of lodgement.

#What is the processing time for South Australia 190 visa in 2025?

South Australia has historically maintained a more manageable nomination volume compared to Victoria or New South Wales, which means its cohort of 190 applicants forwarded to DOHA each year is smaller and tends to move through the queue more quickly. SA's nomination program has also been structured around occupations where health and skills documentation is relatively standardised — trades, healthcare, and engineering — reducing the frequency of complex document requests from case officers.

The state-level nomination assessment itself through the South Australian Government's migration unit (part of Investment Attraction SA) currently takes approximately 6 to 10 weeks from the date you accept your nomination invitation and submit your state nomination documents. This is separate from and precedes the DOHA visa lodgement phase.

#How long does WA 190 visa take to process?

WA's Migration Services unit (part of the Department of Training and Workforce Development) operates one of the more streamlined state nomination programs. The state targets occupations that are in genuine shortage for the WA economy — particularly mining, construction, healthcare, and agribusiness — and nomination decisions are typically issued within 4 to 8 weeks of a complete state application being submitted.

Once a WA-nominated 190 application reaches DOHA, it benefits from relatively lower queue congestion compared to the eastern seaboard states. WA nominates fewer applicants overall than VIC, meaning DOHA case officers are processing a smaller WA cohort. Client data at VJ Consulting suggests that WA-nominated applicants have consistently been among the first to receive grants within each processing year.

#How long does Victoria 190 visa take to process?

Victoria nominates the highest volume of skilled migrants of any Australian state, which means DOHA's incoming 190 queue contains a disproportionately large VIC cohort. Higher volume means longer average wait times, even when individual applications are complete and uncomplicated. In IT and engineering occupations in particular — VIC's most heavily nominated categories — the competition for case officer allocation is intense.

The Victorian state nomination assessment through Skills Victoria also has its own processing phase. In high-demand periods (typically February–May and August–October, aligned with VIC's invitation rounds), the state nomination decision can take 8 to 14 weeks. This is before the DOHA phase begins.

#What is the processing time for 190 visa in Victoria for offshore applicants?

Offshore applicants face structural processing disadvantages that onshore applicants do not. Police clearance certificates from overseas jurisdictions often take longer to obtain and can expire before the visa is granted, requiring re-submission. Health examinations completed offshore may need to be repeated if they lapse (typically 12 months) before the grant is issued. Both issues are common for offshore VIC 190 applicants given the already-extended processing window.

There is no official "offshore fast track" for the 190 visa. DOHA does not publicly differentiate processing priority between onshore and offshore applicants within the same visa subclass. However, anecdotal evidence from our client cohort at VJ Consulting and Education consistently shows offshore applicants waiting 2 to 4 months longer than their onshore counterparts with equivalent documentation quality.

#Why are 190 visa applicants from some states getting grants faster than others?

There are four structural reasons why state of nomination affects DOHA grant speed:

1. Nomination volume: DOHA processes 190 applications in a shared queue regardless of nominating state. When Victoria issues thousands of nominations in a program year and WA issues hundreds, VIC applicants statistically face greater queue competition.

2. Occupation complexity: States that nominate high proportions of IT and professional services workers tend to generate more complex applications — more overseas employers, more overseas qualifications, more police clearances from multiple countries — than states that nominate trades or healthcare workers with more standardised documentation.

3. Application completeness at lodgement: States with more rigorous pre-lodgement checks at the nomination stage (WA in particular) tend to forward better-prepared applications to DOHA, which require fewer requests for further information (RFIs). Each RFI adds weeks to an individual timeline and contributes to overall queue congestion.

4. Offshore vs onshore mix: States with a higher proportion of offshore applicants (which varies by nomination program design and occupation targeting) will see longer average processing times due to the additional document complexity described above.

#What are the current processing times for the 190 state nominated visa in 2025?

The table below summarises current processing benchmarks by state based on DOHA published data and client-reported outcomes tracked by VJCE:

#What is the typical processing timeline for an Australian 190 state nominated visa?

Here is the full step-by-step timeline a 190 applicant should plan around:

The most effective way to compress this timeline is to have your skills assessment, English test results, health examinations, and police clearances all current and ready before you receive your nomination invitation. That way, you can lodge your visa application with DOHA on the same day you receive your state nomination — eliminating weeks of preparation time and entering the DOHA queue as early as possible.

At VJ Consulting and Education, we work with clients from the EOI stage onwards to build this preparation timeline, so that when the nomination arrives, the visa lodgement is ready to go within days. If you are currently waiting on a state invitation or have recently received your nomination, contact our Melbourne office to discuss your specific situation.