Who qualifies for the Child Care Subsidy?
Qualifying for CCS means passing several tests at once. They are about the child, about you as the carer, about the care, and about your family income. Miss one and the subsidy is not payable, even if everything else is in order. The tests below are the standard position; exemptions exist for some circumstances, covered on the other support page.
The child tests
Your child must be 13 or under and not attending secondary school, with some exceptions. Your child must meet the immunisation requirements, or be on an approved catch-up schedule. Immunisation is checked through the Australian Immunisation Register, and a child who is behind without an approved catch-up plan can lose eligibility until the record is fixed. This catches families by surprise more than any other test, so check your child's immunisation status in myGov before you claim, not after.
The carer tests
You must care for the child for at least 2 nights a fortnight, or have at least 14% of the care. You must be the person responsible for paying the fees. You must meet the residency rules: generally, you must be living in Australia and hold an eligible visa or citizenship status. If you share care, the parent with the higher share of care normally claims, and the subsidy follows the child's enrolment, not each parent's separate arrangement.
The care test
The child must attend, or be enrolled to attend, an approved child care service, and the child must attend care at least once in any 26 weeks in a row to stay eligible. A child who never attends cannot attract a subsidy for sessions that never happened, and a long break can end eligibility until care resumes.
The income test
There is no separate pass-or-fail income test with a single cut-off that applies to everyone. Instead, your combined family income sets your percentage on a sliding scale, and the percentage reaches 0% at $538,520 or more in 2026-27. A family above that line is not eligible for CCS at all, because 0% of any fee is nothing. Below that line, every eligible family gets something, even if the percentage is small. The how much page explains the taper in full.
The most common reason for a shock
Families most often lose CCS unexpectedly for one of three reasons: an immunisation record that is out of date, an income estimate that was never updated after a pay rise or a partner returning to work, or a child who has not attended care for 26 weeks. All three are avoidable: check immunisation in myGov, update your income estimate when it changes, and keep at least occasional attendance if you want eligibility to continue.
What does not matter
You do not need to be working to get the baseline 72 hours under the 3 Day Guarantee. You do not need to be an Australian citizen in every case: eligible visa holders can qualify under the residency rules. And you do not need to have a low income: families well into six figures still receive a partial subsidy until the $538,520 cut-off. What matters is the combination of tests above, not any single label.
Sources: Services Australia, Child Care Subsidy eligibility guidance; Services Australia, immunisation requirements for family payments.