Australian Tax for Non-Resident Retirees in Thailand

Reviewed by Greg Berryman, 7 September 2026

Move to Thailand as an Australian retiree, and two separate Australian tax questions open up. What happens to income from outside Australia, and what happens to the Age Pension. They're treated completely differently.

Becoming a non-resident isn't automatic

The ATO doesn't treat "I moved to Thailand" as enough on its own. Four tests decide the question: the resides test, the domicile test, the 183-day test, and the superannuation test. Meet any one of them, and you're still a resident for tax purposes.

This is where retirees often get caught. Keep an Australian house, keep your super onshore, keep the plan open to come back, and the resides or domicile test can hold you as a resident for years after you've left. Genuinely severing ties, selling or renting out the family home, shifting your usual place of abode, matters more than day count.

The ATO has floated replacing this with a simpler 183-day bright-line test. That change hasn't been legislated. The four-test framework is still the law.

Path one: income from outside Australia

Once you're a genuine non-resident, Australia taxes you only on Australian-sourced income. Income from outside the country, an online business, a foreign pension, foreign investments, isn't assessable in Australia at all.

This is the position behind this site. Income from an online business unrelated to Australia isn't taxed here once non-resident status applies. No Australian tax-free threshold, no offsets, no Medicare levy, because there's no Australian tax to begin with.

Path two: the Age Pension

The Age Pension is different. It's Australian-sourced, so it stays taxable even after you become a non-resident, and the non-resident rate is far less forgiving than the resident one.

Swipe across to see all columns.

As a resident As a non-resident
Tax-free threshold Applies None. Tax applies from the first dollar
SAPTO Available Not available
Tax on a pension-only income Usually none, once the threshold and SAPTO are applied Starts at 30%
Medicare levy 2% payable Not payable
Income from outside Australia Assessable Not assessable in Australia at all

Two people with identical Age Pension payments can end up with very different after-tax income, purely based on residency status.

Why this needs two separate calculations

These aren't variations on the same sum. They're two different tax positions running at once.

  • Foreign-sourced income: not assessable in Australia once non-resident. The relevant question becomes what Thailand does with it, covered on the Thailand tax overview page.
  • The Age Pension: assessable in Australia at non-resident rates, regardless of Thai tax residency.

Anyone budgeting for retirement here needs to run both, not just one.

What this doesn't cover

Qualifying for the Age Pension in the first place, and the residency rules around claiming it while overseas, are a separate question from how it's taxed once you're receiving it. That's covered on the Age Pension claim sequence page.

This page, and the Thailand tax overview, cover the general picture.

Not tax advice

This page explains how the two systems interact in principle. Actual figures depend on your income mix, any tax treaty position, and the exact date your residency changed. Talk to a registered tax agent experienced with expats before you rely on this for planning.

Not sure which city fits, or whether the numbers work at all? Take the free assessment.

Sources

This page is built on published Australian tax rules and guidance, not personal experience. Here's where each claim came from: