Australia is becoming more diverse and less religious.
Those are the key finding from the latest Census, taken in 2021.
And the population has continued to grow rapidly, with more than 1 million new residents arriving in Australia over the last five years, the vast majority coming before the borders closed in 2020 due to the global COVID pandemic.
The 2021 Census paints an interesting picutre of the modern Australia, and Theresa Dickenson from the Australian Bureau of Statistics says it shows how migration patterns are changing.
"The number of us who are first generation Australians, those born overseas, and second generation Australians, those with one or both parents born overseas which includes me, has grown and is over half the Australian population now."
The largest increase in the country of birth outside Australia was India, which is now also the third largest country of birth overall, after Australia and England, followed by China and New Zealand.
Mandarin continues to be the most widely spoken language at home other than English, but Punjabi had the biggest increase in speakers since 2016.
A demographer at the Australian National University, Dr Liz Allen, says even those numbers could be underestimating the true nature of multiculturalism in Australia.
"While the majority of Australians are either themselves born overseas or their parents born overseas, that's just the tip of the iceberg. There are many more Australians who identify with what's called a hyphenated Australian status, say for example Asian-Australian, African-Australian and so on."
