Coming to Australia for a working holiday, or just want to travel around the country?
Australia is a huge country, so you’ll need a way to get around. Here are the best options, as well as some tips on how to save money while travelling in Australia!
Buying or renting a vehicle
A popular way to see lots of the country is to rent a car or campervan – or to buy a cheap second-hand car.
Many backpackers drive up or down the east coast of the country, where you’ll find lots of great beaches, towns and cities between Melbourne, Sydney, Byron Bay, Brisbane and Cairns. If you’re feeling really adventurous – and have at least a few months to spare – you could even drive around the entire country!
You can often find cars for sale in backpacker Facebook groups. Or if you’d like to rent a campervan, check out JUCY – they are the specialists and often have great deals on car and campervan rentals.
If you’re really on a budget, having your own car or campervan also comes with the advantage that you can sleep in it for free. 😉
One-way car & campervan relocation deals
You can often save a LOT of money on vehicle rentals by taking advantage of one-way relocation deals. These cost as little as $1 per day. Sometimes the rental company will even throw in some petrol!
Companies offer these heavily discounted rates when they need to relocate their vehicles. It’s cheaper to get a customer to drive the car to its destination, rather than paying someone or getting it towed.
The catch is that the pick-up and drop-off locations are fixed. You would also need to get the car to its destination within a specific date range, and there may be a small booking fee.
The available pick-up and drop-off locations vary depending on the season, but at any given time there are often hundreds of cheap one-way rentals available!
You can find these deals on the following websites:
Long-distance buses in Australia
Many backpackers use buses to travel across Australia.
Greyhound Australia has an extensive network of coach services. If you plan to take multiple trips, a Greyhound Travel Pass could be a good value option.
Flixbus also entered the Australian market in 2025. It offers cheap tickets on routes across the Australian east coast, such as Sydney-Melbourne.
Travelling by train in Australia
Long-distance trains aren’t that much of a thing in Australia. Many of the ones that do exist, like The Ghan from Darwin to Adelaide, are expensive luxury trains. But there are some exceptions.
Commuter trains run on the following long-distance routes, with tickets at affordable prices:
- Melbourne-Adelaide (The Overland)
- Sydney-Melbourne via Albury
- Sydney-Griffith
- Sydney-Dubbo
- Sydney-Canberra
- Sydney-Broken Hill
- Sydney-Brisbane via Coffs Harbour
- Brisbane-Charleville via Roma
- Brisbane-Longreach via Rockhampton
- Perth-Bunbury
- Perth-Kalgoorlie
A useful resource for researching train travel is the Seat 61 website.
The NSW TrainLink Discovery Pass
NSW TrainLink operates long-distance trains and coaches across the state of NSW, as well as from Sydney to Melbourne, Canberra and Brisbane. You can even use NSW TrainLink to get from Sydney to Adelaide by taking a train to the gorgeous outback town of Broken Hill, then a coach the rest of the way.
If you think you might do a few trips with NSW TrainLink, their Discovery Pass gives you unlimited trips for a fixed time period. This can be good value.
Domestic flights in Australia
Travelling overland is well worth it as you’ll get to see more of regional Australia. But if you’re short on time, you can also fly between cities.
Australia has four main domestic airlines:
- Qantas – the largest and most expensive airline
- Virgin Australia – another large airline that often has good prices
- Jetstar – a budget airline owned by Qantas, offering cheap flights to many of Australia’s tourist hotspots
- Rex – a regional airline that flies to country towns using small planes
How to get cheap domestic flights in Australia
You can get cheaper Jetstar flights by booking during their weekly “Friday Fare Frenzy” sales between 4-8pm (AEST) every Friday.
Virgin Australia also runs weekly sales. Their “Happy Hour” sales run from 4-11pm (AEST) every Thursday. You can also save money on Virgin Australia flights by using a discount code!
Finally, on some regional routes with Community Fares, Rex drops its prices on last-minute seats within 24 hours of departure (if there are still seats available).
The Spirit of Tasmania
Want to visit Tasmania? The Spirit of Tasmania ferry is a popular option, especially if you want to take your own car with you.
The boat journey from Geelong (near Melbourne) to Devonport in Tasmania takes 10.5 hours. There are options for both daytime and overnight sailings.
Keep an eye out for sales, including last minute walk-on deals.
Contiki trips in Australia
If you want to let someone else do the work and just enjoy your trip, joining a Contiki tour could be a great way to see lots of Australia – while making great friends along the way.
Some of Contiki’s Australian tours include:
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The 8-day City to Surf trip from Sydney to Brisbane
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The 13-day North Queensland to Uluru trip departing from Airlie Beach
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The 16-day Beaches And Reefs tour from Sydney to Cairns
Plus, Working Holidays for Aussies readers can get a 5% discount on any Contiki trip! Simply book any eligible trip of at least 7 days on the Contiki website and enter the promo code WHFA5OFF at the checkout.
Carpooling
If you don’t have your own car, another option is to carpool with someone who’s already planning to drive to your destination. The rider generally shares the costs with the driver.
There are several reliable apps in Australia that connect people interested in carpooling, including:
Hitchhiking in Australia: A good idea?
Of course, the cheapest way to travel across Australia would be to hitchhike. It’s free, as it relies on the goodwill of a driver to pick you up. But this is not that popular or common in Australia nowadays.
In theory, you can hitchhike in some parts of Australia. However, it’s generally illegal in Queensland and Victoria, and in some other states there are laws against soliciting for rides on the side of a busy highway or motorway.
The main reason, though, that hitchhiking went out of fashion in Australia was a serial killer called Ivan Milat, who kidnapped and murdered at least seven hitchhikers in Australia between 1989 and 1992.
This happened more than three decades ago, and Milat died in prison years ago. But after this very high profile case, the practice of hitchhiking never really recovered in Australia. People still do it occasionally, but Australians in general are quite skeptical and unlikely to pick up hitchhikers.
If you still want to hitchhike in Australia after reading this, Hitchwiki has some great practical tips.
