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Feelings thermometer
About the author
Ryan Neelam
Ryan Neelam was Director of the Public Opinion and Foreign Policy Program at the Lowy Institute. He led the flagship annual Lowy Institute Poll, was project director for the Global Diplomacy Index, and wrote about climate diplomacy and multilateral policy.
The ‘feelings thermometer’ rates Australians’ warmth towards other countries and territories, as well as the European Union and the United Nations, on a scale of 0° (coldest feelings) to 100° (warmest feelings), with each score reflecting the mean of responses.
Australians continue to feel warmest towards New Zealand, at 85°, followed by Japan and the United Kingdom at 75°. By contrast, Australians continue to feel cool towards China this year (33°), despite recent moves towards a stabilisation of the Australia–China relationship. This low reading has been steady since 2021 and is almost half the level of warmth felt towards China five years ago, in 2018 (58°). The only countries that Australians feel cooler towards are Russia (20°) and North Korea (16°).
Feelings towards the United States (63°) have remained largely steady for the last five years, after declining from an all-time high of 73° in 2015.
Feelings towards Indonesia (57°) have warmed incrementally over time, edging up seven degrees since the thermometer began in 2006. Meanwhile, feelings towards India (58°) have fluctuated modestly over time, and currently stand four degrees below a high of 62° in 2006.
For the first time since 2017, Australians were asked how they felt about Solomon Islands. Despite public anxiety about the country signing a security pact with China in March 2022, feelings of warmth towards Solomon Islands (61°) have changed little from 2017, when it scored 64°.
