Geoscience Australia's free data downloads are provided under the Australian Government Spatial Data Access and Pricing Policy.

If you encounter problems downloading information, have an enquiry about a dataset or would like the product sent to you on a CD (cost of transfer applicable) please contact our Sales Centre.

Please note: These free data downloads are available in the following Geographic Information System (GIS) formats:

• ArcInfo export (e00)
• ArcView shapefile
• MapInfo mid/mif

These formats are compatible with a wide range of professional GIS and Image Processing software such as MapInfo Professional, ESRI ArcGIS and RSI's ENVI. GPS mapping programs such as OziExplorer can also be used. A range of free GIS viewing software is listed below, however please be aware that these programs have limited functionality and it is recommended that customers have some familiarity with GIS before attempting to use them. The software downloads can be large, ranging from 10-20MB.

Geoscience Australia does not endorse or offer any support for the following viewing software. For any assistance please contact the respective software developers:

• ArcGIS Explorer (ESRI): viewer for shapefile format (approx. 13MB).
• Geomatica Freeview (PCI Geomatics): viewer for shapefile, e00 and mid/mif formats (approx. 25MB).
• AccuGlobe 2007 (DDTI): viewer for shapefile formats - with extensive functionality (approx. 11MB).
• MapInfo ProViewer (MapInfo): viewer for MapInfo tables. Please note that Geoscience Australia supplies digital data in MapInfo interchange format (mid/mif). Customers will need to convert the mid/mif files to Mapinfo tables (.tab) in order to use our data in this viewer. MITAB is an open source command line program to convert .MIF/MID files to MapInfo .TAB files.
• TatukGIS Viewer: viewer for shapefile, e00 and mid/mif formats (approx. 4MB).
• QGIS Viewer: viewer of shapefile. Used via Linx, Unix, Mac OSX, Windows.