For the first time, Australians from overseas are more likely to come from Asia than Europe

England remains the most common birthplace for Australian migrants at 15 per cent, that's more than halved since 1966. Photo / AAP

By Belinda Tasker

Australians are getting older, are less likely to be religious and for the first time in the nation's history, those who hail from overseas are more likely to come from Asia than Europe.

They're some of the major findings from the 2016 census, which also revealed growing numbers of Aussies are in same-sex relationships, living alone, and identifying as indigenous.

Since the last census five years ago, Australia's population has increased by nearly two million people to an estimated 24.4 million.

With the number of those born overseas rising to just over a quarter of the overall population, Australia now has a higher proportion of migrants than the United States and Britain.

And for the first time, the number of people moving here from Asia has overtaken those from Europe.

While England remains the most common birthplace for migrants at 15 per cent, that's more than halved since 1966.

Two in every five migrants to Australia's shores now hail from Asia, with 16 per cent born in China or India. Migrants tend to be older than those born in Australia, with a median age of 44 compared to 34.

Overall, though, Australia's population is getting older. While your average Aussie is 38, one in six are over 65 and the number of centenarians has hit 3500.

Older Australians are the most likely to be religious, but nearly one third now claim to have no religion compared to 22 per cent in 2011. Of those who have kept the faith, just over half are Christian (down from 88 per cent in 1966) while 2.6 per cent follow Islam and 2.4 per cent are Buddhist.

In terms of where they live, most Australians call a capital city home. Sydney has the most people - 4.8 million, up nearly 10 per cent in five years.

While capital cities are magnets for migrants, indigenous people make up more than a quarter of the Northern Territory's population. And it appears more people than ever are identifying as indigenous, with the number of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islanders rising 18 per cent to 649,171 in the past five years.

There's also been a rise in the number of families, up by about one million to just over six million. While your standard couple with children remain the typical style of family, their numbers have dropped to 45 per cent from 54 per cent in 1991.

At the same time, the proportion of couples without kids has risen from about one third to 38 per cent, while single parent families have jumped 13 per cent to about 900,000.

The number of same-sex couples has leapt 39 per cent to 47,000 in the past five years.

However, while the number of families is rising, there's also more Aussies living by themselves, particularly older women. More than half of the two million people recorded as living alone on census night were women, most of whom were aged about 64.

- AAP