During the last program year for skilled migration in 2025–26, South Australia has been relatively atypical as far as jurisdictions tend to go.
According to records from Home Affairs, South Australia had nominated by 31 May 2026:
1,164 Subclass 190 EOIs and 796 Subclass 491 EOIs.
However, South Australia nears even further as the state also reports data on invitations to apply for nomination.
This makes SA especially advantageous when analysing real selection behaviour.
190 vs 491
The Subclass 190 allows a permanent residence post the successful nomination by a state and issuance of the visa.
Subclass 491 is a provisional regional visa.
The regional pathway is of particular interest to South Australia, where the state's broader migration strategy is aligned with workforce needs in both Adelaide and regional SA.
Don't Confuse Invitations With Nominations
This becomes particularly important when you are analyzing South Australian data.
South Australia has the ability to invite you to apply for your state nomination.
The nomination application is then submitted by the applicant.
If that nomination is approved in Skill Select by South Australia, the EOI will be marked as having received state nomination on Home Affairs records.
As such, SA's invitation numbers and Home Affairs' nomination counts are measuring different elements in the process.
This explains the discrepancies in the numbers.
