Mineral and Petroleum Exploration, Australia

Latest release

Quarterly statistics on mineral and petroleum exploration expenditure by private organisations in Australia

Reference period
March 2025
Released
3/06/2025
  • Next Release 1/09/2025
    Mineral and Petroleum Exploration, Australia, June 2025
  • Next Release 1/12/2025
    Mineral and Petroleum Exploration, Australia, September 2025
  • Next Release 3/03/2026
    Mineral and Petroleum Exploration, Australia, December 2025
  • View all releases

Key statistics

Seasonally adjusted:

  • Mineral exploration expenditure fell by 2.4%
  • Petroleum exploration expenditure fell by 14.3%
Mineral and petroleum exploration expenditure
 Mar Qtr 25
($m)
Dec Qtr 24 to Mar Qtr 25
(% change)
Mar Qtr 24 to Mar Qtr 25
(% change)
Seasonally adjusted 
 Mineral exploration expenditure933-2.4-11.4
 Petroleum exploration expenditure329-14.3-13.4
Trend 
 Mineral exploration expenditure939-0.6-10.2
 Petroleum exploration expenditure3531.78.3

Mineral exploration

Total expenditure, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 2.4% ($23.2m) to $933.0m
  • Trend fall of 0.6% ($6.0m) to $939.2m

Mineral exploration, by deposit type, original series

  • Total deposits fell 18.4% ($181.3m) to $804.7m
  • New deposits fell 20.2% ($54.4m) to $214.9m
  • Existing deposits fell 17.7% ($126.9m) to $589.8m

Mineral exploration, by mineral type, original series

  • Other Minerals recorded the largest fall, down 37.2% ($52.5m) to $88.8m
  • Selected Base Metals also fell, down 18.3% ($39.1m) to $174.9m

(a) Selected Base Metals contains Copper, Silver, Lead & Zinc, and Nickel & Cobalt

(b) All Others contains Mineral Sands, Uranium, Diamonds and Other Minerals

Metres drilled, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted rise of 2.3% (55.1km) to 2,433.7km
  • Trend fall of 0.2% (5.2km) to 2,409.3km

Metres drilled, original series

  • Total deposits fell 11.6% (273.3km) to 2,086.1km
  • New deposits fell 21.9% (133.7km) to 477.9km
  • Existing deposits fell 8.0% (139.5km) to 1,608.3km

Petroleum exploration

Total expenditure, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 14.3% ($54.9m) to $329.3m
  • Trend rise of 1.7% ($5.8m) to $353.2m

Onshore, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 0.5% ($1.1m) to $236.9m
  • Trend rise of 5.6% ($12.6m) to $235.9m

Offshore, seasonally adjusted and trend

  • Seasonally adjusted fall of 36.8% ($53.8m) to $92.4m
  • Trend fall of 5.5% ($6.8m) to $117.3m

Data downloads

Time series spreadsheets

Data files

Data Explorer datasets

Caution: Data in Data Explorer is currently released after the 11:30am release on the ABS website. Please check the time period when using Data Explorer.

Help for: Data Explorer Datasets

Mineral Exploration - Quarterly mineral exploration expenditure and metres drilled

Petroleum Exploration - Quarterly petroleum expenditure

Enquiries

For enquiries about these and related statistics, contact the Customer Assistance Service via the ABS website Contact Us page. The ABS Privacy Policy outlines how the ABS will handle any personal information that you provide to us.

Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 8412.0.

Back to top of the page