What is the capital of Australia?

Canberra is the capital of Australia and the seat of the federal Parliament. The city sits in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT), an enclave carved out of New South Wales between Sydney and Melbourne so that neither rival city would host the Commonwealth government after Federation in 1901.

Construction began in 1913 to a master plan by American architects Walter Burley Griffin and Marion Mahony Griffin, whose design framed the city around a central artificial lake (Lake Burley Griffin) with a Parliamentary Triangle linking Capital Hill, Russell, and City Hill. Parliament moved from Melbourne to the Provisional Parliament House in 1927, and the current Parliament House on Capital Hill opened on 9 May 1988 to mark the bicentenary.

Today Canberra has a population of about 470,000 and hosts the High Court of Australia, the Australian War Memorial, the National Gallery, the National Library, and most foreign embassies. The ACT government, separate from the federal Parliament, runs the territory and is the only Australian jurisdiction where local and territorial functions are combined into one body.

Because Canberra was purpose-built as a political capital, it never developed the heavy industry or commercial centre that defines Sydney or Melbourne. Its economy is dominated by federal government employment, defence, higher education through the Australian National University and the University of Canberra, and the diplomatic corps. The city is laid out to maximise green space, with Canberra Nature Park ringing the suburbs and Black Mountain Tower rising above the city centre. Knowing Canberra is the capital, and that it sits in its own territory rather than in any state, is one of the most commonly tested facts on the Australian citizenship test.