NSW will adopt the National Construction Code (NCC) 2025 on 1 May 2027, giving the state’s building industry more time to adjust.
The NCC is Australia’s primary set of building standards, covering health, safety, amenity and sustainability, published by the Australian Building Codes Board (ABCB) in collaboration with the Australian, state and territory governments. The NCC 2025 implements new provisions for the commercial construction sector and a small subset of quality and safety improvements for residential building.
The ABCB recently published a preview version of the NCC 2025 outlining the changes, which will be available for adoption by state and territory governments from 1 May 2026.
Minister for Building Anoulack Chanthivong said NSW was focused on delivering more homes.
“We are working in lockstep with the construction industry to ensure these homes are high-quality, safe and sustainable. The NCC 2025 represents sensible and reasonable steps towards that goal,” said Chanthivong.
“We want to make sure this does not cause disruption to the construction sector’s ability to deliver homes and meet housing demand in NSW, which is why we have provided a 12-month transition period to the new NCC requirements.
“This transition period will also minimise future compliance risk by allowing industry to plan for the changes in the NCC 2025 and factor them into their new projects ahead of time.”
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NSW’s 12-month transition period will give the construction industry more time to adjust, allowing projects to continue while key amendments are incorporated into new building work. It will also minimise compliance risk and disruption to projects set to commence early next year.
NSW also plans to introduce several variations to the NCC 2025 to ensure the changes align with the state’s policy settings and have minimal impact on the residential construction sector. The variation process will ensure that the new provisions do not conflict with requirements set out in state legislation and the technical building, plumbing and drainage requirements applicable in NSW.
The NSW variations to the NCC will include giving apartment building owners undertaking remedial building works the choice to utilise the waterproofing requirements set out in either the current edition of the NCC or the NCC 2025. This flexibility is expected to reduce costs for homeowners.
Under the package of variations, the NCC 2025 energy efficiency standards will not apply to common areas of apartment buildings.
Information on all NSW variations will be available when the full suite of the NCC 2025 is published on 1 May 2026.