The Annual Market Salary Rate, or AMSR, is the salary an Australian worker would receive for the same role in the same location. Every employer-sponsored nomination has to meet it.

The practical question comes next. How do you work the number out, and how do you prove it?

AMSR is not a single calculation. Three different methods apply, and which one you use depends on two questions: does your business already employ an equivalent Australian worker, and does an award or agreement cover the role? Answer those and the method follows.

In this article, you will find all three methods set out in order, the evidence Home Affairs accepts for each, the rule that catches employers who structure a package rather than a salary, and what changed on 25 March 2026.

It applies to the Subclass 186, the Subclass 482 Skills in Demand, the Subclass 494 and the Subclass 187.

If no employer is sponsoring you, the salary rules below do not apply to your application. The General Skilled Migration pathways run on points instead.

Why AMSR Refuses More Nominations Than Anything Else

A caseworker assessing a nomination checks whether the position is genuine, whether the occupation fits the Core Skills Occupation List, and whether the salary satisfies both salary tests.

The first two questions usually resolve quickly. The salary question generates most of the requests for further information, and most of the refusals we are asked to review.

The reason is straightforward. Employers know they must pay a minimum threshold, so they check that number, clear it, and assume the salary requirement is finished. It is not finished, because the threshold is only one of two tests.

A nomination refused on salary takes the visa with it. Home Affairs decides the nomination first, and if it refuses, your visa application stops there regardless of how strong your personal evidence looks. Your skills assessment, your English score, and your work history never get looked at.

The Two Salary Tests, and Which One Wins

Two separate figures apply to every nomination. You pay the higher one.

Test one: the income threshold.

These figures rose on 1 July 2026, from A$76,515 and A$141,210. Check the date on any source you rely on, and confirm the current amounts on the Home Affairs fees and charges page.

Test two: the Annual Market Salary Rate. What an Australian doing the same job in the same place would be paid.

Here is the part employers miss. A salary of A$85,000 clears the CSIT comfortably. If comparable roles in that city pay A$95,000, the nomination fails, because AMSR is the higher figure and AMSR governs.

Clearing the threshold proves nothing about the market rate. The two tests measure different things.

Both figures are indexed. The thresholds move on 1 July each year, and the visa application charges move with them, so a salary that cleared last year’s number may not clear this year’s.

Branch 1: An Equivalent Australian Worker Already Works in Your Business

The next three sections cover one branch each. Read the one that matches your business, and skip the other two.

For employers.

If you employ an Australian citizen or permanent resident in the same position at the same location, their salary is your AMSR. The analysis ends there. You do not need salary surveys, job advertisements or benchmarking data.

A surprising number of employers run a full benchmarking exercise when the answer is sitting in their own payroll.

What counts as equivalent

Equivalent means the same role, the same location, and the same work. It does not mean a similar job title in a different office, and it does not mean a more senior version of the role.

Ask three questions. Do they perform the same duties? Do they work at the same site or in the same city? Do they sit at the same level of responsibility? Three yeses give you an equivalent worker.

Evidence to gather

Attach all four of these to the nomination:

1. The name of the applicable Fair Work award or enterprise agreement
2. The classification level or occupation classification that applies to the role
3. Recent payslips for the equivalent employee
4. That employee’s signed employment contract

Redact personal details that Home Affairs does not need. Keep the salary, the classification and the position title visible.

Where this branch goes wrong

The most common failure is stretching the definition. An employer nominates a Software Engineer and points to a Senior Software Engineer as the equivalent worker, because that person earns more and makes the file look stronger. A caseworker reads the two position descriptions and sees different roles.

Use a genuine equivalent or move to Branch 2.

Branch 2: No Equivalent Worker, but an Award or Agreement Covers the Role

For employers.

Where nobody in your business holds an equivalent position, check whether a Fair Work award or a registered enterprise agreement covers the occupation. Most Australian roles sit under one.

Three steps.

Step one. Identify the instrument. Search the Fair Work Commission awards list for the award covering your industry and occupation. The Fair Work pay calculator helps confirm it.

Step two. Choose the classification. Awards set pay rates by classification level, and each level describes the duties and responsibilities it covers. Read those descriptions against the actual duties of your role.

Step three. Apply the rate for that classification.

Evidence to gather

1. The award or agreement name
2. The classification level you selected
3. A short written explanation connecting the role’s duties to that classification

That third item is the one employers skip, and it is the one that carries the file. A number with no reasoning behind it looks like a guess. A paragraph explaining why a Level 5 classification matches the position description looks like a decision.

Where this branch goes wrong

Employers sometimes choose a lower classification because it produces a lower salary and an easier budget. That choice is visible. A caseworker comparing your position description against the classification descriptors will see the gap, and the question then spreads from salary to whether the position is genuine at all.

Pick the classification the duties actually support.

Branch 3: No Equivalent Worker and No Award

For employers.

This branch covers genuinely new positions and occupations that no award reaches. It carries the heaviest evidence burden, and it is where most benchmarking work belongs.

The rules expect at least two sources. Use these four categories:

The Fair Work Ombudsman pay guides are worth checking even in this branch, because they sometimes reveal an award you assumed did not cover the role.

Building the file properly

Two sources are the floor, not the target. Three makes a materially stronger nomination, and the cost of a third source is usually an hour of work.

Match the comparison properly. Comparable means the same occupation, the same seniority, and the same city. A Brisbane role benchmarked against Sydney advertisements invites a request for further information, because Sydney salaries run higher and the file looks selectively assembled.

Screenshot every job advertisement you rely on, with the date visible. Advertisements disappear, and a caseworker assessing your nomination four months later cannot open a dead link.

A worked example

A Melbourne software company nominates a Data Engineer. Nobody in the business holds that role, and no award covers it.

The employer pulls three sources. The Jobs and Skills Australia profile for the occupation shows median earnings of A$118,000. Six Melbourne job advertisements for Data Engineers with three to five years of experience, all posted within four months, show a range of A$110,000 to A$135,000. A remuneration survey from a recognised provider puts the mid-point for the role at A$121,000 in Victoria.

The employer sets the salary at A$120,000 and writes two paragraphs explaining the three sources, the range each produced, and why the mid-point of the advertised range matched the seniority of the position.

That file takes about two hours to assemble. A caseworker can follow the reasoning without doing any work of their own, which is exactly the outcome you want.

Write the reasoning down

Set out how you reached the number. Name the sources, give the range each one produced, and explain how you landed on the figure in the contract.

A nomination that shows its working reads as a considered decision. A nomination that states a number and attaches three PDFs asks the caseworker to do the analysis themselves, and caseworkers who have to do that analysis often reach a different answer.

What Does Not Count Towards the Market Salary Rate

Only monetary wages count.

Non-cash benefits cannot be added to reach the AMSR. That includes accommodation, meals, a vehicle, phone allowances, relocation support and equity.

Work through the arithmetic.

An employer looking at that package sees A$93,000 and assumes the salary requirement is satisfied. Home Affairs sees A$75,000, which sits below the A$79,423 threshold before AMSR is even considered.

This single rule sinks nominations where an employer has structured a generous package rather than a straightforward salary. If your offer relies on allowances, restructure it before lodgement rather than after refusal.

  Have your salary structure reviewed before you lodge  

What Changed on 25 March 2026

The rules for determining AMSR gained flexibility across the 482, 494, 186 and 187.

Employers may now use an alternative methodology. Where an equivalent Australian worker exists, they may rely on relevant employment documents. Where none exists, they may rely on relevant market information.

The practical effect helps genuinely new positions most. Before the change, employers filling roles with no obvious comparator struggled to evidence a rate that a caseworker would accept.

One condition still binds. The resulting amount must exceed what an equivalent Australian worker would be paid under the applicable wage instrument. Flexibility in method does not lower the floor.

Read that condition carefully before you rely on the new methodology. It means a caseworker can still compare your figure against an award rate or an internal comparator and refuse the nomination if yours sits underneath. The change widened the range of evidence you may use. It left the standard the evidence has to meet exactly where it was.

The change is recent, so check the publication date on anything you read about AMSR methodology. The current position sits in the legislative instrument and on the Home Affairs sponsoring workers pages.

For Applicants: Three Checks You Can Run on Your Own Offer

For applicants.

You cannot fix your own salary, and you can find out whether it will hold before your employer lodges anything. Raising a problem early is far cheaper than a refusal.

Check one. Find your award. Search the Fair Work pay calculator for your occupation and industry. If an award covers your role, compare its classification rates against your offer. An offer below the award rate will not survive.

Check two. Search live job advertisements. Look for your exact occupation in your exact city, posted in the last three months. Note the range. If your offer sits below the bottom of that range, ask your employer how they benchmarked it. Match the ANZSCO occupation rather than the job title, because titles vary between companies and the code does not.

Check three. Read the Jobs and Skills Australia profile. The occupation profiles publish earnings data by occupation. Compare the median against your offer.

If all three checks put your offer below the market, raise it before lodgement. Frame it as protecting the nomination rather than as a pay negotiation, because that is what it is. A refused nomination costs your employer the SAF levy and the nomination fee, and neither comes back.

  Ask us whether your offer clears the market rate  

Six Reasons AMSR Evidence Fails

These account for most of the salary-related refusals and requests for further information we see.

1. One source instead of two. A single salary survey is an assertion. The rules expect at least two independent sources where no award and no equivalent worker apply.
2. Job advertisements older than six months. Stale ads carry little weight, and they are the easiest weakness to fix.
3. The wrong city. Benchmarking a regional role against capital city salaries, or the reverse, produces a number that does not describe the actual market.
4. Allowances counted as salary. Covered above, and still the most expensive mistake on this list.
5. A classification that does not match the duties. Choosing a lower award classification to reduce cost invites scrutiny of the position description and, from there, the genuineness of the role.
6. A number with no reasoning. No written explanation connecting the sources to the figure. The caseworker then builds their own view, and their view governs.

Our guide to the 186 requirements covers where salary sits among the other five nomination criteria, and our article on which occupation list controls your visa explains how the duties assessment interacts with the ANZSCO code you nominate. If a nomination has already been refused, our page on visa refusals and cancellations sets out what happens next.

Get Your Benchmark Reviewed Before You Lodge

Salary evidence is the most common reason we are asked to rescue a nomination, and almost every one of those files could have been fixed in an hour at the drafting stage.

We benchmark the role, identify which of the three branches applies, assemble the evidence, and write the reasoning that goes with the figure. Our registered agents do this for employers preparing a nomination and for applicants who want to know whether their offer will hold.

  Book a Nomination and Salary Review    Employers: Have Your Benchmark Checked  

No registered migration agent can guarantee a visa outcome. Verify our registration on the MARA register. 

Frequently Asked Questions