Top 10 Richest People in Australia in 2026 and Their Net Worth

Australia's richest person in 2026 is Gina Rinehart, with a net worth of $24.6 billion built almost entirely on iron ore. 

She runs Hancock Prospecting, the private mining company her father started, and turned it into one of the biggest iron ore exporters in the world. Currently, she is at position 101 among the richest people in the world. 

With a net worth of $22.6 billion, Harry Triguboff is the second richest Australian. His wealth is mostly derived from the real estate industry through his apartment-tower development company, Meriton. 

Third is Andrew Forrest with a net worth of $20.1 billion majorly drawn from mining. 

Three of the top three richest Australians have built their wealth either through mining or by investing in real estate. However, among the top 10 richest people in Australia, its not only mining and real estate, tech is also booming.

Atlassian co-founders Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar both cracked $10 billion. Canva's Melanie Perkins and Cliff Obrecht each sit at $7.6 billion. Four of the ten richest Australians built their fortunes in software. In summary, most of the wealthy Australians either got their wealth from trading natural resources or technology. 

Here's a closer look at each of the ten richest individuals in Australia in 2026, what they built, and what you can take from their billionaire playbooks.

Summary table: Richest Australians 2026

Individual net worth profiles of Richest Australians

1. Gina Rinehart

• Net Worth: $24.6 Billion
• Industry: Mining

Gina is Australia's wealthiest person in 2026. She inherited her father's mining company, Hancock Prospecting, and turned it into a global iron ore giant. Under her leadership, the company expanded operations and became one of the top exporters to Asia. Her wealth has slightly pulled back from prior years as iron ore prices moderated, but she remains firmly at the top of the Australian rich list.

2. Harry Triguboff

• Net Worth: $22.6 Billion
• Industry: Real Estate

Harry is Australia's real estate king. He owns Meriton Group, the country's biggest apartment developer. At 92 years old, he's still building skyscrapers and rental apartments in major cities like Sydney and Brisbane — and his net worth has actually grown significantly since last year.

3. Andrew Forrest

• Net Worth: $20.1 Billion
• Industry: Mining, Energy

Also known as "Twiggy," Forrest made his fortune through Fortescue, one of the world's largest iron ore producers. Now he's investing heavily in green hydrogen and clean energy projects through Fortescue Future Industries, making big bets on where the global economy is heading. He also gives billions through the Minderoo Foundation.

4. Anthony Pratt

• Net Worth: $11.5 Billion
• Industry: Manufacturing

Pratt runs Visy Industries, one of the world's biggest packaging and recycling companies. His businesses operate across Australia and the U.S., turning waste into useful packaging at massive scale. He's proof that manufacturing and sustainability can be a very serious wealth play.

5. Mike Cannon-Brookes

• Net Worth: $10.0 Billion
• Industry: Tech, Energy

Mike is the co-founder of Atlassian, a software company used by developers and teams worldwide. He's also one of Australia's loudest voices on clean energy, investing in large-scale solar and battery projects. He believes tech and climate are the two biggest wealth creation opportunities of this generation.

6. Scott Farquhar

• Net Worth: $9.7 Billion
• Industry: Tech, Software

Scott is Mike's co-founder at Atlassian. The two of them started the company from their university days with virtually no outside funding. Today, Atlassian is one of Australia's most successful global tech exports, with products used by hundreds of thousands of teams in over 190 countries.

7. Frank Lowy

• Net Worth: $8.8 Billion
• Industry: Finance, Property

Frank built Westfield, one of the biggest shopping mall brands in the world. He sold the business for a massive sum and his family now manages those proceeds through the Lowy Family Group. At 95, he's a walking case study in building something generational and knowing when to exit.

8. Kerry Stokes

• Net Worth: $7.9 Billion
• Industry: Diversified Media

Kerry Stokes controls Seven Group Holdings, a diversified conglomerate with interests in media, industrial services, and resources. He built his business empire from humble beginnings — he left school at 14 and worked his way up through real estate and media. He now controls Channel Seven, one of Australia's biggest TV networks.

9. Melanie Perkins

• Net Worth: $7.6 Billion
• Industry: Tech

Melanie Perkins leads Canva as co-founder and CEO, with the platform valued at around $42 billion. She started the company with no technical background and faced over 100 investor rejections before Canva became one of the most-used design tools on the planet. Today it has hundreds of millions of users across 190 countries.

10. Cliff Obrecht

• Net Worth: $7.6 Billion
• Industry: Tech

Cliff Obrecht is the co-founder and COO of Canva, with his net worth derived primarily from his roughly 18% ownership stake in the company. He and Melanie built Canva together from Perth, Australia — a city investors initially dismissed as too remote to produce a global tech company. Both Cliff and Melanie have signed the Giving Pledge, committing to donate more than 80% of their wealth to charitable causes.

Final Thoughts

Look at the top 10 richest people in Australia in 2026 and one thing stands out immediately: not one of them got rich by playing it small. Gina Rinehart didn't just manage her father's company — she scaled it into a global iron ore powerhouse. Harry Triguboff didn't build a few apartments — he built an entire city's worth of them. Mike Cannon-Brookes and Scott Farquhar didn't sell software to Australian businesses — they sold it to the world.

The biggest similarity across all ten is scale of thinking. Whether they dug it from the ground, developed it on land, or shipped it as software, every person on this list found a market much bigger than their backyard and built for it relentlessly.

The second pattern worth noting is staying power. Frank Lowy built Westfield over decades before making one of the smartest exits in Australian business history. Harry Triguboff is still building at 92. Kerry Stokes left school at 14 and spent years grinding before he controlled one of the country's biggest media empires. Overnight success is not represented on this list.

For a young Australian looking at these names and wondering what the path looks like, the evidence in this list points to three things. First, pick an industry with a long runway — mining, property, and tech have all produced multiple billionaires on this list because they are industries that compound over time. Second, think beyond Australia from day one. Atlassian and Canva are not Australian companies that went global — they were built global from the start. Third, find a co-founder you trust completely. Cannon-Brookes and Farquhar built Atlassian together. Perkins and Obrecht built Canva together. On a list of ten individuals, four of them succeeded in pairs.

The entry points will look different in 2026 than they did when Rinehart took over Hancock or when Triguboff built his first apartment block. But the underlying formula has not changed: find a real need, build something that scales, and don't stop.

Forbes List: Top 50 Richest Australians (2026 Update)