Yes, with an International Driving Permit carried alongside it. The Australian permit is the 1949 booklet — correct for Thailand and the only kind Australia issues — and it comes from your state motoring club, acting as an agent for the Australian Automobile Association. The part that decides whether your trip goes well is not the permit, though. It is whether your Australian licence carries a motorcycle class.
How permits work in general, and how Thailand treats foreign licences, are covered in the full IDP guide and which licence Thailand recognises. This page is the Australian version: which booklet, which club, what Smartraveller says, and why the R class on your card matters more than anything else on it.
- Convention that appliesThe 1949 Geneva Convention — Australia is a party to it, not to the 1968 one
- Booklet you needThe 1949 IDP
- Who issues itThe Australian Automobile Association, through the state clubs — NRMA, RACV, RACQ, RAC, RAA, RACT and AANT
- Cost and validityReported at roughly A$53 to A$65 by club and channel. Twelve months from issue
Why Australians get a 1949 permit
Thailand is a party to both UN road traffic conventions — the 1949 Geneva one since 1962 and the 1968 Vienna one since May 2021. Australia acceded to the 1949 Convention in December 1954 and never joined the 1968 one. Because 1968 replaces 1949 only as between states that have both signed up, Thailand's older obligation towards Australia stands untouched. The 1949 booklet is correct, and it is the only one available to you.
British travellers are told to carry a 1968 permit for the same country. They are right too — the answer depends on your passport, not on Thai law.
The provision behind it
Article 48 of the 1968 Convention terminates and replaces the 1949 Convention "in relations between the Contracting Parties" to 1968 — and Australia is not one. The 1968 Convention's transitional treatment of 1949-format permits ran for five years and expired in 1982, so that is not the reason your booklet works. Article 48 is.
Where to get one
The Australian Automobile Association is the only body authorised to issue International Driving Permits in Australia. In practice you deal with your state club as its agent: NRMA, RACV, RACQ, RAC in Western Australia, RAA, RACT and AANT. Prices differ by club and by whether you apply online or walk into a branch — reported figures sit around A$53 in branch and rather more for online issue with delivery. Membership is not required.
Apply two to three weeks before you fly if you are using the post. You cannot obtain an Australian permit once you are overseas, and the sites offering instant "international driving licences" by email are not issuing convention documents.
The R class, and why it decides your whole trip
Australian licences carry vehicle classes — C for car, R for motorcycle (RE in some states for the restricted, learner-approved class), and so on. The permit transcribes what you already hold: a C class becomes category B, and an R class becomes category A. No R, no category A, no motorcycle entitlement in Thailand.
This is the single most consequential fact on this page, because the machine most Australians end up on in Phuket, Koh Samui or Krabi is a 110cc or 125cc automatic scooter. Nothing about its size helps you. Thailand issues car and motorcycle licences as separate documents; both conventions carry motorcycles as one undivided category A; and Thailand has declared that it treats mopeds as motorcycles. There is no engine capacity small enough to be exempt. See the Thai motorbike licence and engine sizes.
Learner licences need a note: the conventions exclude learner permits from recognition altogether, so there is nothing to translate if you are still on Ls.
What Smartraveller says
The Australian travel advice for Thailand is direct on the paperwork. It tells travellers they need a valid international driving permit together with an Australian driver's licence for the type of vehicle being used, warns that Australian digital driver's licences may not be accepted, and states that driving without the correct licence can lead to arrest or jail. Carry the plastic card as well as the app.
On risk, it records that Thailand has one of the highest traffic-related fatality rates in the world, that motorcyclists are most at risk, that accidents are common in resort areas including Phuket, Pattaya and Koh Samui, that Australians are regularly injured or killed in motorbike accidents there with alcohol often involved, and that after an accident police may detain or arrest you until compensation is agreed — which can cost thousands of dollars. What to do after a road accident in Thailand covers that last point in order.
The insurance clause Australians actually get caught by
Australia is the one country on this site where we have a travel insurer's motorcycle wording in front of us rather than a summary, and it is worth quoting because the phrasing is the trap. Fast Cover's motorcycle conditions require, for a machine of 125cc or under, that "You must hold both a current Australian Drivers Licence (Provisional or higher) (regardless of the local laws) and a licence valid for the country that you are riding in." For anything over 125cc it requires "a current Australian Motorcycle Licence (Provisional or higher) valid for the same class of motorcycle, moped or scooter (regardless of the local laws)" plus, again, a licence valid for the country you are in.
Three things fall out of that. "Regardless of the local laws" means the insurer applies its own licensing test even where Thai police would never have stopped you. The pillion clause — "The person in control must hold a current licence (Provisional or higher) valid for the same class of motorcycle, moped or scooter that is valid for the country that you are in" — means a passenger's cover can depend on the rider's licence, which almost nobody checks before climbing on the back. And cover applies "when riding on both sealed and unsealed public roads only", with none for motocross, off-road, jumping, racing or competition.
That is one insurer's wording, not a general rule. Do not assume every Australian policy says the same thing, and do not assume any of them explicitly requires an IDP — the wording above does not mention one. What it does require is "a licence valid for the country that you are riding in", which is precisely the phrase an international permit exists to satisfy. Read your own product disclosure statement's motorcycle section before you fly, and if you are unsure, ask the insurer in writing. What voids your motorbike cover in Thailand covers the other common exclusions.
Longer stays
A 1949 permit expires twelve months after issue, and the conventions let a country decline to recognise a foreign permit held by someone who normally lives there. Australians who winter in Thailand year after year eventually meet both limits, and the answer at that point is a Thai licence.
Frequently asked questions
Will my digital driver's licence do?
Smartraveller specifically warns that Australian digital licences may not be accepted overseas. Take the physical card. A digital document depends entirely on the officer in front of you recognising it, and at a checkpoint outside a tourist centre that is not a bet worth making.
I have a car licence only. Can I ride a 125cc scooter?
No — not lawfully, and not with your insurance intact. Rental shops in tourist areas routinely hand over scooters without checking anything, which is widely reported and changes nothing. Your R class, or its absence, is what an insurer will look at. See renting a motorbike without a licence in Thailand.
How long is an Australian IDP valid in Thailand?
Twelve months from the date of issue, and never beyond your Australian licence. The widely repeated claim that an IDP lasts only 90 days in Thailand has no statutory or Department of Land Transport basis that we could find, and appears in neither convention.
What about riding as a passenger?
Worth checking. At least one Australian insurer conditions a pillion passenger's own cover on the rider holding an appropriate licence for the machine. If you would not get on the back of a scooter in Australia with an unlicensed rider, apply the same test in Kata.