The proportion of Australians born overseas has hit a 120-year high, including a near-tripling over the past decade of the number of Australian residents born in India, new figures show.

The data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics, released on Wednesday, also reveals that Victoria again gained the most new residents from interstate last financial year, with a net gain of 10,200 people.

The percentage of Australian residents born overseas has increased every year for the past 15 years and, in June last year, reached 28.2 per cent, or 6.7 million people. This is the highest rate since the late 1800s.

People from Britain remained the largest group of overseas-born residents, forming 5.1 per cent of the Australian population, or 1.2 million people. This proportion has decreased slightly over the past decade.

New Zealand-born residents make up the next largest group (2.6 per cent), followed by China (2 per cent), India (1.8 per cent) and the Philippines and Vietnam (both 1 per cent).

The number of Australian residents born in India has almost tripled over the last 10 years to about 433,000. In the same period, residents born in China have more than doubled to almost 482,000.

ABS spokeswoman Beidar Cho said the increasing median age of Italian-born migrants – from 64.7 years in 2005 to 69.3 years in 2015 – reflected a drop in recent migration from that country.

Conversely, the median age of Indian migrants had fallen in the same period from 37 to 33.4 years.

Victoria was the top performer on interstate migration last financial year, with a net gain of 10,200 people from other states and territories, compared to 8800 the previous year. Queensland came in second with 6400 interstate migrants, while NSW suffered a net loss of 6600. This loss was a stark reduction in the 25,600 people who left NSW for interstate a decade earlier.

NSW received the highest number of overseas migrants last financial year – 66,100 people. Tasmania received the lowest number, at 1000 people.

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