Proston, QLD

By Lauren McCaleb · Reviewed by Dylan Duncan · Updated 1 June 2026

Proston is a rural town on Queensland's South Burnett, about 50 kilometres north-west of Kingaroy and 295 kilometres north-west of Brisbane. Its name comes from a pastoral run, itself a corruption of an Aboriginal word, possibly from the Waka language, meaning kurrajong tree. The district was settled from 1910 through a land ballot that drew English families, and the town grew once the railway arrived in 1923 and a co-operative butter factory opened in 1934; the closing of both in the 1970s began a long, slow decline. Dairying, beef cattle and duboisia, a shrub grown for medicine, support the area today. Lake Boondooma lies nearby, and a local curiosity is Sidcup Castle, built by Harold Douglas as a replica of his childhood home in Kent.

5/100

Suburb Score

Among Australia's less advantaged suburbs

Proston is more socio-economically advantaged than about 5% of the 14,462 Australian suburbs we score, based on the ABS SEIFA index (raw score 856, where about 1000 is the national average).

A socio-economic measure from ABS Census data — not a measure of how good a suburb is to live in or visit. How we calculate this.

Proston at a glance

Population (2021): 410
Median age: 54
Median weekly household income: $764
SEIFA score: 856
Coordinates: -26.1828, 151.5856

Proston demographics (2021 Census)

The figures below profile Proston using the Australian Bureau of Statistics 2021 Census; every percentage is a share of a clearly stated Census count, so each one traces back to the source. At a glance, the largest age group is seniors (65+) at 33%, 18% of homes are rented, and 10% of residents were born overseas.

Age profile

Age group	People	Share
Children (0–14)	57	14%
Youth (15–24)	35	9%
Young adults (25–44)	70	17%
Mid-life (45–64)	112	28%
Seniors (65+)	133	33%

Share of the 407 people counted by age.

Housing and households

Tenure	Dwellings	Share
Owned outright	104	57%
Owned with a mortgage	32	18%
Rented	33	18%

Dwelling type	Dwellings	Share
Houses	163	96%
Townhouses & semis	3	2%
Flats & apartments	0	0%

Tenure and dwelling shares are of the roughly 169 occupied private dwellings in Proston.

Median weekly rent: $180
Median monthly mortgage: $624
Average household size: 2 people
Median weekly family income: $918
Median weekly personal income: $452

Community and culture

Born overseas: 34 (10%)
Speaks a language other than English at home: 11 (3%)
Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander: 26 (6%)

Work and education

Completed Year 12: 88 (26%)
Labour-force participation: 33%
Unemployment rate: 12.1%
Employed full-time: 54
Employed part-time: 35

Source: ABS Census of Population and Housing, 2021 (General Community Profile, by Suburb and Locality). © Australian Bureau of Statistics, released under CC BY 4.0. How we group bands and derive each share is set out on our methodology page.

Common questions about Proston

Where is Proston?

Proston is a suburb of Queensland, Australia.

What is the population of Proston?

At the 2021 Census, Proston had a population of about 410.

Is Proston an advantaged area?

Proston has an ABS SEIFA score of 856, where about 1000 is the national average — higher scores indicate greater relative socio-economic advantage. That gives it a Suburb Score of 5 out of 100 — more socio-economically advantaged than about 5% of Australian suburbs.