When many Australians think of heroin, they picture the steep increases in use and harms of the 1990s.

But new annual data, released today, shows samples of people who use heroin are doing so more often, at a frequency not seen for decades.

Other drug trends revealed include expanding stimulant markets, rising use of illicit tobacco, and shifts in the way nitrous oxide is used.

Each year we speak to people who use drugs

Each year, our research teams speak with hundreds of people across Australia who use illegal or non-prescribed drugs. These interviews form the backbone of two long-running, national drug monitoring systems.

The Ecstasy and Related Drugs Reporting System interviews people who use ecstasy and other stimulants in each capital city.

The Illicit Drug Reporting System focuses on people who inject drugs.

Here are some of this year’s findings.

Heroin now used more often

Steep increases in heroin use and harms in the 1990s were followed by the “heroin drought” of the early 2000s, a period during which heroin became much harder to obtain.

Since then, the proportion of people in our sample who reported using heroin in the previous six months has fallen, from 79% in 2000 to 51% in 2026.

But people are using it more often. Historically, people in our survey who used heroin reported doing so around an average three days a week. In 2026, this increased to daily use, on average. This is the highest frequency since monitoring began in 2000.

Unsurprisingly, we saw a connected significant increase in the proportion of participants likely to have opioid dependence.

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