Bondi, NSW 2026

Bondi, seven kilometres east of the Sydney CBD in the Waverley local government area, is the suburb behind Australia's most famous beach, home to 10,411 residents at the 2021 census. The name comes from the Aboriginal word 'boondi', meaning water breaking over rocks, and the suburb today is a mostly medium- and high-density residential area strung along Bondi Road. Bondi Beach — technically a neighbouring suburb sharing the 2026 postcode — is one of the most visited tourist sites in Australia, the setting for the TV series Bondi Rescue and Bondi Vet, and the spiritual home of Australian surf life saving: Bondi Surf Bathers Life Saving Club was formed there in 1907. Domain paints Bondi as a cosmopolitan mix of families, young professionals and retirees, including expat communities from England, South Africa and Brazil, drawn by the beach lifestyle, bars, restaurants and the annual Sculpture by the Sea exhibition.

At a Glance

Transport

Bondi has no railway station of its own: the Eastern Suburbs railway line, opened on 23 June 1979, terminates underground at neighbouring Bondi Junction, where T4 trains run to the city roughly every five minutes, reaching Martin Place in about seven minutes. Buses carry the local load — the limited-stops 333, Sydney's busiest bus route, runs Circular Quay–Bondi Junction–Bondi Beach–North Bondi via Oxford Street and Bondi Road, operated by Transdev John Holland (transportnsw.info; Wikiwand). Light rail stops well short of Bondi: the CBD and South East Light Rail (L2/L3), opened 2019–20, terminates at Randwick and Kingsford, and while extending it to Bondi Junction has been advocated for over a decade — Waverley Council endorsed a Bondi Junction–UNSW corridor as early as 2012 — the extension remains uncommitted and unfunded as of mid-2026, with the 2026–27 NSW Budget steering new transport investment to Sydney Metro and Parramatta Light Rail Stage 2 instead.

Schools

Primary schooling centres on Bondi Public School, a NSW government school on Wellington Street whose buildings are on the NSW heritage database, alongside Montessori East for younger students. Just over the boundary at Bondi Beach sit government Bondi Beach Public School and special-education Wairoa School, with private options including Galilee Catholic Primary and Reddam House's Bondi campus, which Mansion Global calls 'an abundance' of choice for five-to-12-year-olds (Mansion Global). Reddam House Sydney, an independent co-educational day school in the global Inspired group, runs its senior campus (Years 10–12) at North Bondi with its main campus in Woollahra. Secondary students also draw on nearby independent schools such as Waverley College in Waverley and Moriah College at Queens Park.

Shopping & Amenities

Big-ticket retail sits just west in Bondi Junction: Westfield Bondi Junction, one of the largest shopping centres in the Sydney metropolitan area, houses 331 stores across 131,259 m² directly above Bondi Junction station. Bondi's own shopping and dining spine runs along Bondi Road, while at the beach end Campbell Parade is a cafe-and-restaurant promenade with beach views and Bondi Pavilion, the community cultural centre with its theatre, gallery and studios. Hall Street, a block back from the beach, is Bondi's gourmet food precinct — The Hub hosts bills, Da Orazio, Lulu Bondi, Gelato Messina and a Harris Farm market, and Bondi Markets run every Sunday at Bondi Beach Public School.

Parks & Outdoors

Bondi Beach — the closest ocean beach to the Sydney CBD and listed on the Australian National Heritage List in January 2008 — is the suburb's great outdoors: a wide, patrolled surf beach with a foreshore promenade, skate park and the famous 'Bondi icebergs' view from its southern headland. The Bondi to Coogee coastal walk runs about 6 km along the cliffs from Bondi past Tamarama, Bronte and Clovelly to Coogee, taking roughly 1.5–2 hours one way, and its Bondi-to-Tamarama stretch is the setting for the annual Sculpture by the Sea exhibition. At the southern end of the beach, Bondi Icebergs' tidal ocean pool — opened by the winter-swimming club founded in 1929 — offers year-round swimming, a sauna and clubhouse above the waves. The City2Surf fun run finishes on the beach each August, and Waverley Park and Bondi Golf Course at North Bondi are within easy reach.

Property Market

The median house price in Bondi was around ~$4.2M–$4.9M depending on tracker (mid-2026): realestate.com.au lists a Bondi median house price of $4,212,500 on 36 sales over the past 12 months, up 11% year-on-year, while CoreLogic data via YIP puts the median at $4,905,000 (42 sales, +12.76% over 12 months to May 2026); Domain's bed-type table shows 3-bedroom houses at $4.05M and 4-bedroom at $5.2M. See our full Sydney property price map for how the suburb compares across the city. Bondi is one of Sydney's most expensive suburbs, though its headline medians sit below neighbouring Bondi Beach, where most beachfront trophy homes fall. House medians swung from about $4.2M to $5.4M across trackers in mid-2026 because house sales volumes are very low and heavily mix-driven. Units dominate the stock and median consistently around $1.46–1.5M. Renting is widespread — 57% of occupied dwellings are rented versus 43% owner-occupied. The suburb's 2021 census population was 10,411, up 3.6% on 2016, with median household income of $2,534/week and most residents in professional occupations.

New Developments

The big growth story is at Bondi Junction, about 2 km west of the beach: in July 2026 Waverley Council adopted the Bondi Junction Master Plan, a long-term blueprint to add about 3,000 dwellings (10% of them affordable) plus 9,000 m² of new public space, centred on a reinvigorated Oxford Street Mall with a new 1,500 m² public square and a new civic precinct with up to 10,000 m² of community infrastructure (Waverley Council media release, July 2026). Housing growth is concentrated in five areas — Oxford Street Mall (1,250 dwellings), Bondi Road East Gateway (770), the Civic precinct (520), Bronte Road Village (340) and West Oxford Street Village (120) — with implementation to follow via Waverley LEP and DCP amendments. Individual projects already moving include a reworked mixed-use tower at 7–19 Bondi Road cleared by the Land and Environment Court and Cassa Blanka's revised 16-storey mixed-use tower in Bondi Junction in public exhibition (Urban Digest), while closer to Bondi itself the Halcyon apartments at 1–7 Andrews Avenue are among the suburb's current new developments.

Jobs & Local Economy

Tourism, retail and hospitality anchor the local economy: Bondi Beach is one of Australia's most visited tourist sites, drawing around two million visitors a year and sustaining a dense strip of cafes, restaurants, hotels and surf-and-lifestyle retail along Campbell Parade, Hall Street and Bondi Road. Bondi Junction, 2 km away, is the eastern suburbs' commercial and civic heart — the Bondi Junction–Waverley SA2 is a strong employment hub with full-time employment above the national average and unemployment well below it — anchored by Westfield Bondi Junction's 331 stores above the station. Waverley Council, whose civic and administrative base sits at Bondi Junction, is another major local employer in the LGA (Waverley Council).

Nearby Suburbs

Bronte, Tamarama, Bondi Junction, Woollahra, North Bondi

Sources & method

Researched 4 September 2026 from named public sources — census and government records, transport authorities, council and planning documents — plus published sales data. Where sources disagree on a figure, the guide says so rather than picking one.

Sources cited in this guide:

• Wikipedia — Bondi
• Wikipedia — Bondi Beach
• Wikipedia — CBD and South East Light Rail
• Wikipedia — Moriah College
• Wikipedia — University of New South Wales

Corrections are welcome — if something here is out of date or wrong, tell us and we will fix it.

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