Private School Fees by Capital City (2026): What the Biggest Independent Schools Charge

Year 7 at one of Sydney's biggest independent schools typically costs about $45,400 in compulsory charges in 2026 — almost seven times the typical figure in Darwin ($6,765). We read the 2026 fee schedule of the eight largest independent schools in every Australian capital, straight from each school's own website, and turned them into one comparable number: what a family must pay for one Year 7 student for the year.

The headline is not the gap between cities. It is the gap inside them. Most of Australia's biggest independent schools are not expensive ones — over half of the 52 schools charge under $20,000 a year — and very few sit in the middle.

Key takeaways

• Sydney's biggest independent schools are the dearest in the country: five of the six that publish fees charge between $44,298 and $45,860 for Year 7.
• Darwin and Hobart are the cheapest capitals for a big independent school: medians of $6,765 and $10,767.
• The middle is missing. Of 52 schools, 29 charge under $20,000 and 18 charge $30,000 or more. Only 5 fall between $20,000 and $30,000.
• Big does not mean expensive. Some of the largest schools in Sydney and Melbourne charge under $5,000 a year.
• 10 of the 62 biggest schools have no readable 2026 fee schedule online. For those, ask the school directly — the table tells you which.

How much does Year 7 cost at a big independent school in each capital?

The typical compulsory cost runs from about $45,400 a year in Sydney down to about $6,800 in Darwin. Each figure is the median of the schools in that capital that publish a 2026 schedule, so the number of schools behind it matters.

Per school week spreads the annual cost across a 40-week school year. It is the easiest way to compare a school fee with the other things a family pays for every week.

Half of the 52 schools charge less than about $17,400 a year for Year 7. The famous $45,000 schools are real, but they are the top of the market, not the typical big independent school.

Treat Perth and Adelaide with care. Only five of their eight biggest schools publish a readable 2026 schedule, so one school either way moves the median a long way.

Why is there almost nothing in the middle?

Australia's big independent schools fall into two groups with a gap between them. One group is the long-established grammar and church schools charging $30,000 to $46,000. The other is the low-fee Christian, Islamic and Lutheran schools, most charging under $15,000 and often including camps and devices in a single fee.

That shape matters if you are budgeting. A family priced out of a $40,000 school is often not choosing between that and a $25,000 school. The next option down can be $10,000 to $15,000, and it may include more in its single fee than the expensive school does.

What does each school actually charge?

Every figure below was read from the school's own 2026 schedule in October 2026. The bold figure is the compulsory annual cost for one Year 7 student — tuition plus the levies every student pays. A + means the school also charges a compulsory item whose amount it does not publish, so the real cost is a little higher.

Sydney

Sydney's five biggest traditional schools are priced almost identically — all within $1,600 of each other. The range in Sydney comes from the low-fee Islamic schools, not from differences among the grammar schools. For a wider list of Sydney schools, see our Sydney private school fees comparison.

Melbourne

Melbourne has the widest spread of any capital among its biggest schools: $4,270 at Al-Taqwa College to $44,484 at Carey. More Victorian schools and their fees are on our Victorian school fees page.

Brisbane

Brisbane is the only one of the five biggest capitals where all eight of its largest independent schools publish 2026 fees. Half of them charge under $15,000. More Brisbane schools are in our Brisbane private school fees comparison.

Perth

See also our Perth private school fees comparison.

Adelaide

Three of Adelaide's eight biggest independent schools do not have a readable 2026 schedule online — as in Perth, the most of any capital. Our Adelaide fees comparison lists more of the city's schools.

Canberra

Canberra has the narrowest spread of the big capitals: its cheapest big school, Daramalan College, still charges $12,796. More in our Canberra private school fees comparison.

Hobart

No big Hobart school charges more than $26,020 for Year 7, and two of the eight — Calvin and Emmanuel — include camps and excursions in a single fee.

Darwin

Darwin has only six independent secondary schools in its metropolitan area, so all six are here. Four charge between $6,620 and $6,870 a year, and three of those say the fee includes camps.

Is the tuition fee what you will actually pay?

No — tuition alone understates the bill at most schools. At Caulfield Grammar the compulsory charges on top of tuition add $4,587. At Genesis Christian College they add $2,255 to an $8,583 tuition fee.

Three things decide how far apart the tuition and the real cost are:

• Levies. Technology, resource, capital and activity levies are often compulsory. We count them when every Year 7 student pays them.
• Camps. Some schools include camps in the fee; others bill them per event. Where a camp is billed separately with no published amount, the school is marked +.
• Per-family charges. Building funds, P&F levies and capital contributions billed once per family are left out of the per-student figure. A one-child family pays them on top.

What is not in any figure: uniforms, books bought separately, optional activities, transport, one-off enrolment fees and voluntary donations. Our guide to when private school fees jump in Year 7 covers the one-off costs at entry.

What should you ask a school that doesn't publish its fees?

Ask for the full schedule for the year your child will start, not just the tuition line. Ten of the 62 schools we set out to check had no readable 2026 schedule online:

• 3 do not publish fees online at all — you have to ask.
• 2 now show only their 2027 fees — useful if your child starts next year, but ask for the current year if you are comparing.
• 2 keep the schedule in a document viewer that only opens in a full web browser.
• 1 shows only an older schedule online, 1 sends the schedule on request, and 1 keeps it behind a parent login.

When you ask, check four things: the Year 7 tuition band, every compulsory levy, whether camps and a device are included, and which charges are per family. That is exactly what a published schedule would have told you.

What this means for your family

• Compare the compulsory total, never the tuition line. Two schools with the same tuition can differ by $4,000 or more once levies are added.
• Look below the obvious names. In every capital, at least one of the eight biggest independent schools charges under $15,000.
• Plan for next year's rise. Several schools have already published 2027 fees, typically 3 to 7 per cent higher than 2026.
• Check what help exists. Scholarships, bursaries and sibling discounts can change the real price a lot. Our guide to private school scholarships and how families pay for private school fees cover the options.

You can also browse every school's profile, and fees where a school publishes them, on our school fees pages for each state.

How we built the index

• Which schools. For each capital we took the eight largest independent schools teaching secondary years by enrolment, within a fixed radius of the city centre (Sydney and Melbourne 40 km; Brisbane and Perth 35 km; Adelaide 30 km; Canberra, Hobart and Darwin 25 km). School names, locations and enrolments come from our school directory. A distance-education school and a senior-only program were excluded because they have no comparable Year 7 fee. Darwin has six eligible schools. Catholic systemic schools are not included, because their fees are often set by the diocese — see Catholic vs independent school fees.
• Which figure. The compulsory annual cost for one Year 7 day student in the 2026 school year: tuition plus every levy all Year 7 students pay. Where a school prints its own total, we used it, unless it included a per-family charge, which we removed. Per-term and per-quarter fees were multiplied to a year.
• Where it came from. Every figure was read from the school's own fee schedule or fee page, in October 2026. Search snippets and third-party fee sites were not used — several we checked were out of date.
• No substitution. A school without a readable 2026 schedule stays in its city's table and is left out of the median, rather than being replaced by a smaller school.
• Medians, not averages. Each capital's figure is the median of its publishing schools. It describes the biggest independent schools, not every independent school in the city, and it is not a national average fee.

Limitations

• Five to eight schools per capital is a small sample. Treat a city's median as a description of its biggest schools, not a precise price index.
• Schools publish on different bases. We applied one rule to all of them, but a school that rolls camps into its fee will look more expensive than one that bills camps separately.
• Fees change every year. These are 2026 figures; several schools have already moved to 2027.

To cite this: "AroundSchools, Private School Fees by Capital City (2026), based on 52 school fee schedules read in October 2026." Please link to this page.

Frequently asked questions

What is the average private school fee in Australia in 2026?

There is no reliable single national figure, because schools publish fees on different bases. Among the 52 biggest independent schools we checked, half charge less than about $17,400 a year for Year 7, and the typical figure ranges from $6,765 in Darwin to $45,402 in Sydney.

Which capital city has the most expensive private schools?

Sydney. Five of its six biggest independent schools that publish fees charge between $44,298 and $45,860 for Year 7 in 2026. Melbourne is next, with a median of $34,700.

Which capital city has the cheapest private schools?

Darwin, with a median of $6,765 for Year 7 among its six independent secondary schools, followed by Hobart at $10,767.

Do these fees include camps and laptops?

It depends on the school. The What the figure covers column says what each school's figure includes. Where a compulsory camp or device is billed separately with no published amount, the figure carries a +.

Why isn't my child's school in the table?

The index covers only the eight largest independent schools in each capital, so the comparison is fair across cities. Our city fee comparisons and the school fees pages cover many more schools.

Are 2027 fees available yet?

Some schools have published them already. Where a school's website now shows only 2027 fees, the table says so. We will update this index once most schools have published.

Related reading

• Sydney private school fees compared
• Brisbane private school fees compared
• Catholic vs independent school fees
• When private school fees jump in Year 7

Fees as published by each school for the 2026 school year, read October 2026.