Australian rules football in Australia

Australian rules football in Australia
Contesting for possession in an indigenous community football game in the Northern Territory
Country	Australia
Governing body	Australian Football League
National team(s)	Australia
First played	1858; 166 years ago (1858) in Melbourne, Victoria
Registered players	555,629 (2023)[1]
Clubs	2,672[2]
National competitions
AFL AFL Women's
Club competitions
List Northern Territory FL South Australian NFL Tasmanian FL Victorian FL West Australian FL
Audience records
Single match	121,696 – Collingwood vs Carlton, at the MCG (1970 VFL Grand Final)
Season	7,238,858 – 2011 AFL season[3]

Australian rules football (referred to simply as football or footy in all states except New South Wales and Queensland where it is promoted under the acronym AFL by the local development bodies) is the most watched and attended sport and the second most participated code of football in Australia. Since originating in Victoria in 1858 and spreading elsewhere from 1866, it has been played continuously in every Australian state since 1903 plus the two major territories since 1916.

The sport is played by more than half a million Australians. Players participate at an organised level in various forms from Auskick (age 5) through to school-based, underage (up to age 19), open age, to Masters (35+) competition. It is the second largest code of football in Australia overall by number of participants after soccer. The season runs in most states and territories during the cooler seasons in Australia (from March to September), avoiding clashes with cricket, with the exception being the northern part of the Northern Territory where the season runs during the wet season (October to March). The highest participation rates (players per capita) can be found in the Northern Territory (5%), South Australia (4.8%), Victoria (4.3%), Western Australia (4.2%), Tasmania (3.3%) and the Australian Capital Territory (2.4%). Unlike other football codes which are strongest in urban areas, Australian rules football has the highest participation in regional and remote areas. Nationally this rate is 5.7%, almost double that of any other code. It is also fast growing in New South Wales and in Queensland, though with participation rates there of 1.2% it is considered a minor sport, lagging behind soccer and rugby league in overall interest. These two states represent more than half of the Australian population and this dichotomy of football culture is referred to as the Barassi Line.

Australian rules football holds the match attendance record of any football code in Victoria (121,696), South Australia (66,987) Tasmania (24,968) and the Northern Territory (17,500).

The national professional competitions are the men's Australian Football League (AFL) and AFL Women's (AFLW). These are the most popular professional football competitions of any code, with millions of TV viewers across the country. The AFL governs the code nationally through the AFL Commission based in Melbourne. The AFL originated in Victoria and changed its name from Victorian Football League in 1990 after a successful program of national expansion and for these reasons the governing body is often seen by those from other states as having a strong Victorian bias.

While the AFL phased out state and territory representative matches as it expanded nationally (with the exception of occasional matches featuring Victoria), players can still represent their states up to the age of 19 through the AFL Under 16 Championships and AFL Under 19 Championships or through their lower tier (semi-professional) state competitions.

Australia competes internationally mainly against New Zealand. Australia's national teams remain undefeated. From 2007 to 2019 the underage men's team competed annually against international opponents as the AFL Academy. Australia has fielded amateur teams against South Africa, Papua New Guinea and the United States. Sides representing Indigenous Australia have competed against Papua New Guinea and South Africa.