What Does ABN Status Mean?

Common status values

Active

An Active status means the ABN registration is in effect as of the recorded date. Most entities in the dataset carry this status. Active confirms the registration is current in the public record.

Cancelled

When an ABN shows Cancelled, the registration is no longer current as of the effective date shown. The entity may have cancelled voluntarily, or the registry may have cancelled it. Either way, the ABN itself is no longer in effect - though the business behind it may still be operating under a different registration or structure.

Other values

Most records show either Active or Cancelled. If a record displays a different or blank status value, it may reflect a transitional state or a data gap. The site displays whatever value appears in the source dataset.

In practice

Say you look up a supplier's ABN and see Active with an effective date of 1 January 2015. That tells you the registration has been current since that date. It does not tell you whether the supplier is still trading or whether their tax affairs are in order. What it does confirm is that the ABN registration itself remains in effect in the public record.

Now imagine a different lookup returns Cancelled with an effective date of March 2024. That means the ABN registration ended on that date. The business may have closed, restructured, or simply cancelled an ABN it no longer needed.

How status appears on this site

ABN status shows up in several places:

• Record pages display the current status alongside other key fields like entity name, ABN, and GST registration
• Change feeds flag when a status value changes between weekly snapshots, so you can see transitions over time
• Glossary pages define each status value for quick reference

When the site detects a change during its weekly refresh, it records both the old and new values with the detection date. For a step-by-step walkthrough, see How to Check If an ABN Is Active.