Sep 17, 2026
TL;DR: To be eligible for the NDIS you must be under 65 when you apply, be an Australian citizen, permanent resident, or hold a Protected Special Category Visa, and live in Australia. You also need a permanent (or likely permanent) impairment that substantially affects your daily life, or qualify through early intervention. Eligibility isn’t means-tested. The NDIA decides within 90 days of a complete application.
Eligibility for the NDIS comes down to three tests: age, residency, and the impact of your disability. You must be under 65, living in Australia as a citizen, permanent resident, or Protected Special Category Visa holder, and have a permanent impairment that significantly affects daily life. Or you can qualify through the early intervention pathway instead. Meeting all three tests is what gets your application over the line; what ends up in your plan is a separate conversation.
You’re eligible if you meet the age requirement, the residency requirement, and either the disability requirement or the early intervention requirement (or both). All three tests have to be satisfied. Meeting two out of three isn’t enough. Families across Western Sydney, including Toongabbie, Parramatta, Blacktown, and the Hills District, often start by checking these three tests before anything else.
You must be younger than 65 on the day your completed application is submitted. There’s no lower age limit; children can apply from birth. If you’re approaching 65 and want to apply, contact the NDIA (or a provider like Mercy Life Care) well before your birthday. A late application can’t be accepted even if everything else about your situation qualifies.
You need to be an Australian citizen, hold a permanent residency visa, or hold a Protected Special Category Visa (this applies to some New Zealand citizens). You also need to live in Australia. The NDIA looks at where your home, family, and daily life are based, not just your visa status. This applies the same way whether you’re based in Parramatta, Blacktown, or anywhere else in Greater Sydney.
To meet the disability requirements, the NDIA needs evidence that:
All five points need to be true together. Meeting one or two isn’t enough. For many participants, this shows up day-to-day as assistance with daily personal activities, like personal care, mobility, and hygiene support, or as help with household tasks like cleaning, organising, and general home upkeep. Some diagnosed conditions are automatically considered likely to meet these requirements. For most people, evidence comes from a treating doctor or specialist who’s worked with them for at least six months.
Early intervention is for people whose impairment is permanent or likely permanent, where getting support now is likely to reduce how much support they need later. Adults can qualify for early intervention too, not just children. Unlike the standard disability pathway, early intervention support isn’t always needed for life. Children under 6 with developmental delay have a separate, slightly different set of requirements under this pathway.
No. NDIS eligibility is not means-tested. Your income, savings, or Centrelink payments have no bearing on whether you qualify. The NDIA looks only at age, residency, and the functional impact of your disability.
The federal government’s Thriving Kids program begins rolling out state-based services from 1 October 2026, reaching full scale by 1 January 2028. From 1 January 2028, children aged 8 and under with developmental delay or autism assessed as having low-to-moderate support needs will access support through Thriving Kids rather than an individual NDIS plan. This won’t affect any child already enrolled in the NDIS before that date, and children with high support needs remain eligible for the NDIS as usual. Families in Toongabbie, Blacktown, and the Hills District with a young child approaching this pathway should factor the 2028 date into any planning conversations now.
The NDIA decides NDIS eligibility, not us. As a registered provider with 25 years’ experience across Toongabbie, Parramatta, Blacktown, and the Hills District, our team helps families understand what evidence the NDIA is looking for and what to expect at each stage. Every support worker on our team brings a minimum of three years’ experience, and we respond to every referral within 24 hours. Once a plan is approved, getting started doesn’t mean more waiting. Once you’re eligible, our Support Coordination team can also help turn your plan into action. If you’re unsure where you sit against the criteria above, ask us. It’s one of the most common questions our team gets.
Q: Can I apply for the NDIS if I’m over 65?
A: No. You must submit a complete application before your 65th birthday. If you’re already over 65 and weren’t previously an NDIS participant, you’d generally be directed to My Aged Care instead. If you’re approaching 65, apply as early as possible to avoid missing the cutoff.
Q: Do I need a specific diagnosis to qualify?
A: Not exactly. The NDIA assesses your impairment and its functional impact, not your diagnosis label. Two people with the same diagnosis can have very different impairments and different outcomes, so what matters is how the condition affects your daily life.
Q: How long does the NDIA take to decide if I’m eligible?
A: Once your application is complete, the NDIA has 90 days to decide you’re eligible, not eligible, or that they need more information. If you’re asked for more information, they then have 14 days to decide once you provide it.
Q: What if I’m told I’m not eligible?
A: You can ask for an internal review within 3 months of the decision. A different NDIA staff member will check the decision, and if you still disagree, you can take it to the Administrative Review Tribunal. Support coordinators and local area coordinators can also connect you to non-NDIS services in the meantime.
Q: Does a fluctuating condition still count as permanent?
A: Yes. If your condition varies in severity, worse some weeks and better others, it can still meet the permanence requirement as long as the overall impact on your life is ongoing.
NDIS eligibility rests on three tests: age, residency, and disability impact (or early intervention). All three need to be met, not just some. It’s not means-tested, and diagnosis alone isn’t the deciding factor; functional impact is. If you’re in Toongabbie, Parramatta, Blacktown, or the Hills District and want to talk through where you or a family member sits against these criteria, get in touch with our team or call 0423 867 716.
