Smoking rates in Australia have fallen to their lowest level on record, according to new figures that offer a striking contrast to the images of celebrities lighting up at parties and fashion shoots that keep popping up on social media feeds.

The latest National Drug Strategy Household Survey, released this month by the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, found that just 5.6% of Australians aged 14 and over now smoke daily, down from 8.3% in 2022 to 2023 and a world away from the 19.5% recorded back in 2001. Among adults aged 18 and over, the daily smoking rate has dropped to 5.8%, edging the country ever closer to its national target of getting adult daily smoking below 5% by 2030.

For a country that has spent decades chipping away at tobacco use through tax rises, plain packaging, advertising bans and graphic health warnings, these figures mark a genuine milestone. Around 1.3 million Australians now smoke daily, compared with roughly 1.8 million in 2022 to 2023 and 3 million in 2001, even as the population has grown substantially over that period.

Young adults, often the group most exposed to tobacco marketing, have also moved away from cigarettes. Current smoking among 18 to 24 year olds, covering daily, weekly and occasional use, dropped to just 6.1% in 2025.

Vaping levels off, but pouches are the new worry

While smoking rates in Australia continue their long slide, the picture around vaping is a little more mixed. Daily vaping held steady at 3.6%, roughly where it sat in 2022 to 2023, a notable change after years of steep growth. Among young adults, current vaping use fell sharply, from 20.6% in 2022 to 2023 down to 14% in 2025, suggesting the tighter rules brought in during 2024 that limit vape sales to pharmacies are having an effect.

Crucially, there is no sign that young people who might once have vaped are now switching to cigarettes instead, a claim some critics of the pharmacy vape model had predicted. That should reassure anyone worried the restrictions would simply push nicotine use from one product to another.

The product now on the radar is the nicotine pouch, a small flavoured sachet tucked between the lip and gum. The survey asked about pouches for the first time this year and found 1.8% of people aged 14 and over had used one in the past 12 months. Among 18 to 24 year olds, that figure jumped to 8.4%, well above the rate for traditional tobacco snus. With discreet packaging, sweet flavours and a growing presence on social media, pouches carry an obvious risk of drawing a new generation into nicotine dependence who might never otherwise have picked up a cigarette or a vape.

Illicit tobacco is undercutting progress

Alongside the encouraging headline figures sits a more troubling trend. Among people who currently smoke, one in three, 34%, recently bought or used illicit tobacco, more than double the 16.7% recorded in 2022 to 2023. Cheap, unregulated cigarettes sold without health warnings or plain packaging make smoking more affordable and easier to access, chipping away at the very policies that have driven Australia’s daily smoking rate down for two decades.

Why demand reduction still matters most

It would be easy to read these figures and conclude the job is largely done. That would be a mistake. The steady fall in smoking rates in Australia has not happened by accident. It is the product of sustained investment in reducing demand for tobacco and nicotine, through mass media campaigns that highlight the harms, support services that help people quit, smoke free public places, and marketing restrictions that make cigarettes less visible and less normal, particularly to young people.

Cracking down on illicit tobacco supply matters, and so does tightening the rules around where and how nicotine products can be sold. But enforcement alone will not stop a 14 year old from being drawn in by a flavoured pouch marketed on social media, or a young adult from picking up a cheap illicit cigarette because it is easy to find. The evidence from this survey points to one consistent lesson. When education, quitting support and marketing limits are properly funded and sustained, tobacco and nicotine use falls. When that focus slips, new products and new markets move in to fill the space.

Smoking rates in Australia are now closer than ever to meeting the 2030 target. Finishing the job will depend less on chasing whatever product emerges next and more on continuing to reduce the demand that keeps the whole nicotine market alive in the first place.

Source: dbrecoveryresources