Distance between Melbourne and Sydney (straight line)
The straight-line distance between Melbourne and Sydney, both in Australia, is 713 km (443 miles), as the crow flies, measured from one city centre to the other. It is the shortest path over the Earth's surface; any road between them is longer.
Straight-line distance
713 km
443 miles · straight line
Heading from Melbourne
54° (northeast)
initial compass bearing to Sydney
Flight time estimate, not a booking
~55 min
at about 800 km/h, in the air only
Straight-line (great-circle) distance, as the crow flies. The road distance is longer.
MelbourneSydneyThe line is the great circle: straight over the globe, curved on a flat map.
Measure your own two places
Pick any two cities, addresses or coordinates in the calculator, or start from where you are standing. It gives the same straight-line distance, in miles and kilometres.
Melbourne to Sydney at a glance
- Straight-line distance
- 713 km (443 miles), as the crow flies
- Heading from Melbourne
- 54° (northeast) to Sydney
- Heading from Sydney
- 230° (southwest) to Melbourne
- Midpoint
- 35.8813° S, 148.1631° E, halfway along the straight line
- Flight time estimate, not a booking
- About 55 min in the air at a cruising speed of 800 km/h along the straight line. Take-off, landing, the real flight path and any stops add more.
- Melbourne, Australia
- 37.8140° S, 144.9633° E (city centre)
- Sydney, Australia
- 33.8678° S, 151.2073° E (city centre)
Nearby city pairs
Other distances from Melbourne
- Melbourne to Adelaide654 km
- Melbourne to Gold Coast1,346 km
- Melbourne to Brisbane1,375 km
- Melbourne to Perth2,721 km
- Melbourne to London16,904 km
Other distances from Sydney
- Sydney to Gold Coast686 km
- Sydney to Brisbane733 km
- Sydney to Adelaide1,162 km
- Sydney to Auckland2,156 km
- Sydney to Perth3,290 km
- Sydney to Singapore6,299 km
Questions
Is 713 km (443 miles) the driving distance from Melbourne to Sydney?
No. 713 km (443 miles) is the straight-line distance between the two city centres, as the crow flies. A road route is always longer, because roads bend around terrain and water, and MapGO does not measure driving distance or travel time.
How is the distance between Melbourne and Sydney measured?
Along a great circle: the shortest line over the Earth's surface, from Melbourne's centre (37.8140° S, 144.9633° E) to Sydney's (33.8678° S, 151.2073° E). This is what "straight-line distance" and "as the crow flies" mean on a globe. On a flat map the line can look curved.
How accurate is this distance?
Within about 0.5% for the two centre points. The figure treats the Earth as a sphere (the haversine formula), while the real Earth is slightly flattened, which shifts a long straight-line distance by up to about 0.5%. Measuring from another part of either city changes it more, since a large city can be tens of kilometres across.
Computed by MapGO from each city's centre point (GeoNames) with the haversine formula. All distances on this page are straight lines over the Earth's surface, not road distances.