CPR Refresher Frequency in Australia: How Often to Renew
Refresh your CPR every 12 months. Australian guidance is consistent on this: the Safe Work Australia model code of practice recommends annual CPR refresher training, and a full first aid qualification such as HLTAID011 is renewed every three years. The two clocks run side by side, and mixing them up is one of the most common reasons workplaces fall out of compliance.
This guide explains where the 12-month figure comes from, when it is a recommendation and when it is a hard rule, and how managers and individual workers can keep it simple.
TL;DR
CPR (HLTAID009 skills) should be refreshed every 12 months. First aid qualifications (HLTAID011, HLTAID012 and similar) are renewed every three years.
The annual figure is best practice in the national code, but your industry regulator, licence or workplace policy can make it mandatory.
A valid three-year first aid certificate does not mean your CPR is considered current.
Under work health and safety law, the business (the PCBU) is responsible for keeping first aiders’ skills current, and a higher-risk or remote site may justify training more often.
Track CPR and first aid dates separately, and book refreshers well before the 12 months run out.
Table of Contents
The short answer: 12 months for CPR, three years for first aid
If you hold a nationally recognised first aid certificate, you are really holding two time frames:
Skill | Recommended renewal | Typical unit |
CPR refresher | Every 12 months | HLTAID009 Provide Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation |
Provide First Aid | Every 3 years | HLTAID011 Provide First Aid |
First aid in education and care | Every 3 years (CPR annually) | HLTAID012 |
Advanced first aid and resuscitation | Check your employer or regulator | HLTAID014, HLTAID015 |
The Australian Children’s Education and Care Quality Authority (ACECQA) describes the same pattern as the industry standard: first aid, anaphylaxis and asthma training renewed every three years, with CPR refreshed in between.
We hear one version of the same mistake often. A team member’s certificate says it is valid for three years, so everyone assumes the whole thing is covered. It is not. The three-year date is when the full qualification should be renewed. The CPR component is expected to be refreshed at 12 months and again at 24 months.
Where the 12-month rule comes from
Three bodies shape what you will hear, and they play different roles.
Safe Work Australia
The model Code of Practice on first aid in the workplace says first aiders should attend training regularly to refresh their knowledge and skills and confirm their competence. It recommends refresher training in CPR annually, and a full first aid qualification every three years. A model code is guidance that states adopt in their own form, so check the version that applies where you work. In Western Australia, WorkSafe WA’s first aid page is the place to start.
The Australian Resuscitation Council
The Australian Resuscitation Council (ARC) is careful here. Its resuscitation standards note that the best interval for retraining has not been firmly established. What it does say is that people who do not perform resuscitation regularly need repeated refresher training, and it recommends that trained individuals refresh their skills at least annually.
That honesty is useful. The 12 months is not a magic number. It is a sensible ceiling on how long an unpractised skill should sit unused.
Industry regulators and licensing bodies
This is where annual CPR becomes a rule rather than advice. In Queensland, for example, licensed crowd controllers must renew their HLTAID009 CPR training every 12 months to keep their licence. Childcare, security, healthcare and many mine and construction site inductions work the same way: a regulator or a site policy turns the recommendation into a condition.
Recommendation or requirement? How to tell
The national code is advice, but the work health and safety duty behind it is not. Safe Work Australia and WorkSafe WA place responsibility on the person conducting a business or undertaking (PCBU) to manage first aid risks. In practice, if you cannot show that first aiders are competent and current, you will struggle to show that you have met that duty.
Use this order when you need a firm answer for your own situation:
Your licence or regulator. If your industry has a licence condition, that wins. Read the renewal conditions, not the summary.
Your workplace first aid risk assessment. It should state what training your hazards call for. If you do not have one, our first aid risk assessment guide walks through four steps.
Your employer’s policy or site induction requirements. Many clients set annual CPR for everyone on site, whatever the minimum is elsewhere.
The national recommendation. If nothing above is stricter, 12 months for CPR and three years for first aid is the baseline to follow.
When the answer is unclear, assume annual CPR. It costs far less than an audit finding or an unprepared first aider.
Why CPR is refreshed so often
Certificates are paperwork. CPR is a physical skill, and physical skills fade. The practical risk is not that someone has forgotten the steps. It is that compressions lose depth and rate, and the confidence to start quickly slips, when the skill is not practised. The ARC’s standards stress that people who do not use resuscitation regularly need repeated training for exactly this reason.
A few practical points follow from that:
Short and regular beats long and rare. A brief hands-on practice each year keeps technique sharper than a full-day course every three years alone.
Compressions are the weak point. Correct depth and rate, and swapping rescuers about every two minutes to avoid fatigue, are the things that fade. The ARC’s in-hospital resuscitation guideline describes alternating compressors regularly regardless of how tired they feel.
Equipment changes too. If your site has an automated external defibrillator, the person using it should be comfortable with it. See our note on AED training for managers and WorkSafe WA’s bulletin on maintaining AEDs, which covers checking pads and batteries because they expire.
Does a CPR certificate expire after 12 months?
This depends on who you ask, and the honest answer is: it depends on what the certificate is for. The unit of competency itself does not carry a legal expiry printed by the national register. The 12-month date is the point at which guidance, and very often your employer or regulator, expects you to have refreshed. That is why a first aid certificate can look valid on paper and still be treated as out of date by a site, a childcare service or an auditor.
The practical rule for individuals: if your work requires first aid or CPR, treat 12 months as your expiry date. If you only hold it for personal reasons, it is still the date the ARC recommends.
Sectors where the answer is usually stricter
Mining, construction and remote work
Remote sites are a clear case where the baseline may not be enough. Distance from emergency services changes the risk. If help is hours away rather than minutes, a first aider may be managing a patient far longer, which is a reason to look beyond the minimum. This is what the risk-management approach in the work health and safety framework is for: when your hazard profile changes, your training may need to change with it.
For those sites, HLTAID013 Provide First Aid in Remote or Isolated Site is built around that longer-care scenario. Many sites also ask for annual CPR from every worker, not only designated first aiders.
Education and care
Childcare services follow ACECQA requirements, with first aid, anaphylaxis and asthma training renewed every three years and CPR refreshed annually, as set out on the ACECQA page. Educators typically hold HLTAID012.
Security and licensed industries
Some licences, like the Queensland crowd controller example above, hard-wire the 12-month CPR renewal. Always check your own state’s licensing page.
Healthcare
Clinical settings often set their own resuscitation education schedules. The ARC’s clinical standards require a process of education so staff can perform CPR, and individual organisations decide the detail. Advanced life support certifications run on different cycles again: the ARC says its ALS courses are valid for up to four years.
What a CPR refresher involves
A refresher is not a different course. You are assessed again against the same HLTAID009 competency, which covers recognising an emergency, performing CPR on an adult, child and infant manikin, using an AED where relevant, and managing the scene until help arrives. Expect to demonstrate hands-on compressions, not only answer questions.
What to bring to a session:
Your previous certificate or statement of attainment, or your unique student identifier.
Clothing you can kneel in.
Any workplace requirement, such as an emergency plan, that you want the trainer to build scenarios around.
For teams, on-site delivery makes the most sense. It removes travel time, and the scenarios can match the workplace.
A simple tracking system that prevents lapses
Most lapses are not caused by people refusing to train. They happen because dates sit in different places. A training matrix with two separate date columns for each person fixes most of it:
Name | Role | First aid qualification date | First aid due (3 years) | CPR last done | CPR due (12 months) |
Example worker | Supervisor | 14 March 2025 | 14 March 2028 | 20 March 2026 | 20 March 2027 |
Set reminders for 60 days before each CPR due date, so you can book a session around rosters and shutdowns. If your business already tracks maintenance or licences in software, the same approach can hold certification dates, and guidance on technician qualification tracking shows how a system can flag lapsed qualifications before a worker is rostered. Whatever you use, keep the CPR and first aid dates separate. For more on how the two intervals interact, read our guide to the 3 years or 12 months question and our workplace refresher requirements.
A worked example
A contractor in Port Hedland completes HLTAID011 in February. Their first aid qualification should be renewed by the following three-year mark. But their CPR should be refreshed by the next February, and the one after that. If they only book a course at year three, they will have worked two years with CPR beyond the recommended interval, and that is the gap an auditor or incident review will notice.
Our perspective: treat CPR as a yearly habit, not a renewal chore
We train teams across the Pilbara, including at remote mine and construction sites, and the pattern we see is consistent. Businesses that handle CPR well are the ones that decide the date once, put it in a calendar and plan the session around the roster. Those that struggle are the ones that treat the certificate as the goal.
Our view is simple. The 12-month figure is the minimum that makes sense for a skill people rarely use, and for a site where help is far away it is a starting point. We would rather help you build annual practice into your year than sell you a rushed course the week before an audit. That is why we deliver on site, outside standard business hours if needed, and tailor scenarios to your actual hazards.
If you manage a team, ask yourself one question: if someone collapsed tomorrow, would the nearest trained person have practised in the last 12 months? If the answer is not a clear yes, book the refresher.
— Vapour
Book your CPR refresher with Prime First Aid and Training
Our HLTAID009 Provide Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation course is $150 per participant. We deliver on site anywhere in the Pilbara, run flexible sessions outside standard hours, and issue certificates promptly after completion. If you need the full qualification, HLTAID011 Provide First Aid is $240, and HLTAID013 for remote or isolated sites is $400.
Ready to schedule a group or an individual? Book online or see all courses. We would love to work with you.
FAQ
How often should I refresh my CPR in Australia?
Every 12 months. The Safe Work Australia model code recommends annual CPR refreshers, and the Australian Resuscitation Council recommends that trained people refresh at least annually. Your employer or regulator may make this compulsory.
How long is a first aid certificate valid for?
The full qualification, such as HLTAID011, is generally renewed every three years. CPR within it should still be refreshed annually. Our article on first aid certificate validity explains the split in more detail.
Is annual CPR a legal requirement?
Not everywhere. The national code sets it as a recommendation, but some licences, such as Queensland crowd controllers, require it. Workplace policies and sector rules, including in education and care, often require it too, so check your own regulator and employer.
What if my CPR has lapsed for more than a year?
Book a CPR course as soon as you can. A lapsed refresher does not make you untrained, but it does leave you outside the recommended interval, which matters for compliance. If your first aid qualification is also beyond three years, check with your trainer whether you need the full course again.
Do remote workers need to refresh CPR more often?
They may. The duty on a business to manage risk means a remote site, where help takes longer to arrive, can justify more frequent practice than the baseline. Talk to your safety manager about what your site requires.
Sources
Model Code of Practice: First aid in the workplace (Safe Work Australia)
Resuscitation standards for clinical practice and education (Australian Resuscitation Council)
Health and Safety Bulletin No. 11: AEDs at workplaces (WorkSafe WA)
Working as a crowd controller: ongoing requirements (Queensland Government)
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