Single-Sex vs Co-Ed School Fees in Australia

Single-sex schools in Australia do cost more than co-educational ones — but not for the reason the headline suggests. The premium is not a price on single-sex teaching; it is that the schools which happen to be single-sex are, overwhelmingly, the oldest, most endowed independent schools in the wealthiest suburbs. Change nothing about a school except the mix of boys and girls and the fee would not move. Here is what the real, source-verified numbers show, and why "single-sex is expensive" is the wrong way to read them.

Why we don't quote a single "single-sex median". Schools publish fees on incompatible bases and many don't publish online, so an average across them is precise-looking and misleading. Instead we use real 2026 fees read from each school's own schedule this month, and let the pattern speak.

Key takeaways

• The expensive schools are single-sex — but the cheap ones being co-ed doesn't make single-sex teaching expensive. It's a selection effect: old, endowed, western/eastern-suburbs independents happen to be single-sex.
• Boys' and girls' schools cost about the same. In Perth, Christ Church (boys) is $37,173 and St Hilda's (girls) $37,491; in Sydney, Sydney Grammar (boys) is $52,410 and SCEGGS (girls) $48,152. Whatever drives the premium, it isn't applied by gender.
• Plenty of single-sex schooling is affordable — it mostly lives in the Catholic system, where colleges are set to be low-fee.
• Co-ed is not "the cheap option" either. Co-ed spans everything from a $5,552 systemic Catholic college to a $25,000 independent — the label tells you little about the price.

Why the gap is not what it looks like

Two facts, both from source-verified 2026 fees, dismantle the "single-sex costs more" reading.

First, boys' and girls' schools cost almost exactly the same. If single-sex teaching carried a price, you would expect boys' and girls' schools to diverge — but they sit on top of each other. In the same city, the flagship boys' and girls' schools are within a couple of thousand dollars, and often closer:

Second, the single-sex schools are simply the expensive schools for other reasons — age, endowment, land, location. Perth's entire top tier is single-sex Anglican schools in a 9–11km arc of riverside suburbs; Sydney's is the old harbourside and north-shore colleges. It isn't that single-sex teaching is dear; it's that the schools founded in the 1800s with large grounds and old-money catchments happen to be single-sex, and those are dear whatever their intake.

Meanwhile the affordable single-sex schools — and there are many — sit in the Catholic system, where fees are set by capacity to contribute rather than a market. If single-sex schooling matters to you and the independent price does not work, that is where to look.

What this means if you are actually choosing

• Don't read the label as the price. A co-ed school can be $5,552 (a systemic Catholic college) or $25,308 (an independent); a single-sex school can be $6,000 in the Catholic system or $52,410 at the top of the independent one. The sector and the specific school decide the fee, not whether it's single-sex.
• If you want single-sex on a budget, start with the Catholic system. That is where most of Australia's affordable single-sex schooling is.
• Model the whole commitment. Fees rise about 5–6% a year (ABS, via Futurity's 2026 index) and climb across secondary — see what six years of private school actually costs for the six-year math and the ways families fund it. For city detail, our verified roundups cover Sydney, Perth and Adelaide, and Catholic versus independent fees covers the sector question.

What we cannot tell you from this data

Nothing here is a claim about outcomes. There is a large, contested research literature on whether single-sex or co-educational schooling produces better academic or wellbeing results, and once you account for the socio-educational profile of who enrols (the ICSEA index on My School), most of the apparent difference narrows. A fee table cannot settle that debate, and we won't pretend it can. Use the fee for what it is — a budget constraint — and judge the teaching on a tour and on the outcomes each school and the ACARA data actually publish.

Frequently asked questions

Do single-sex schools cost more than co-ed schools? On average yes, but it's a selection effect, not a price on single-sex teaching: the schools that happen to be single-sex are mostly old, endowed independents in expensive suburbs. Co-ed schools span from about $5,552 (a systemic Catholic college) to $25,000-plus (a top independent), and single-sex schools span an even wider range.

Do boys' schools cost more than girls' schools? No — they're close to identical. In Perth, Christ Church (boys) is $37,173 and St Hilda's (girls) $37,491; in Sydney, Sydney Grammar (boys) $52,410 and SCEGGS (girls) $48,152. The premium is about which schools are single-sex, not about gender.

Where is the cheapest single-sex schooling? In the Catholic system, where colleges set fees by capacity to contribute. Many Catholic single-sex colleges charge a fraction of the independent single-sex schools.

Is single-sex or co-ed better for my child? That's not a fee question, and the research is genuinely mixed once you account for who enrols at each school. Judge it on a tour and on published outcomes, not on the price.

School fee figures are each school's own published 2026 schedule, read at source in September 2026. Fees change annually and levies vary — confirm with the school before enrolling. AroundSchools holds no academic results and does not rank schools on quality; nothing here is a claim about single-sex or co-educational outcomes.