Mind games, blindsides, and physical showdowns. They’re all in a day’s play on Australian Survivor – the hit show that sees a group of castaways marooned in a remote location where they must rely on survival skills, social strategy, and physical endurance to win a hefty cash prize.
And yet the local incarnation of the global hit franchise delivered a shock no one was expecting when it axed series host Jonathan LaPaglia out of the blue in June 2025. It was a move, he confessed, that hurt “like a b***h”.
Where is Survivor Australia filmed in 2025?
The news means Jonathan’s final series will be season 13’s Australia v The World, which features returning Australian players and legends from the international versions. The series, which was filmed in Samoa, airs 17 August 2025 on Network 10 and 10Play.
It’s a sad departure for the man who had been quick to praise the authenticity of the show over the years.
Indeed, the New York Times previously declared that the Australian version of the show had been “outplaying the US version for a while” – and Jonathan credited that to the Australian version sticking to an “old-school” format.
“The US show has really evolved over the years, pushing the boundaries. Some of it worked really well, some not so much,” he told Chattr in February 2025.
“Personally, I like the push to try new stuff, but I’m guessing some in the audience feel otherwise. We produce a show that is a little more old school.”
“I’m all for the evolution of the game, so I love new-school players. But I’m also an old-school dude who was introduced to Survivor with all the great old-school players. So I really love both,” Jonathan continued.
In an interview with B&T, Jonathan spoke more about the enduring success of the show.
“Even though the end goal is the same every season – to win the title of Sole Survivor – I am always surprised by the creative ways players take to get there,” he explained. “The paths are infinite. And I think that’s a huge reason for the longevity and success of the format. It’s always unpredictable and surprising.”
Is the show Survivor real or staged?
Unpredictable and surprising, it may appear on TV, but in 2023, Jonathan faced questions about whether producers saved their favourite players by throwing them elimination lifelines on the show.
“That may be true of other shows. There’s always online chatter when we have a twist and someone says, ‘They saved you because they like you’ or he’s controversial or whatever,” he told TV Tonight.
“But the honest truth is our game is so big and so tight that the schedule just doesn’t have that latitude. We can’t pull things up to try and save someone.”
“If we’ve got someone that goes to, you know, Redemption Rock, or whatever we call it for that season, that’s already been in the works before we even started the game. It’s just the way it folds,” he went on.
“But the audience is always suspicious, which I understand. But there really is no room in the schedule to make those kinds of decisions. I mean, we are shooting every single day. There’s just no way we can move stuff around.”
“A regular season is incredibly exhausting”
In another candid insight, given to New Idea in February 2025, Jonathan revealed just how hard it was to film two seasons back to back, describing it as “brutal”.
“A regular season is incredibly exhausting by itself. The entire crew is practically dead by the end of it. So, stacking another season on the end of that is asking a lot. It’s like running a marathon, then adding a 4000m sprint at the end,” he explained.
Is Australian Survivor scripted?
The star also gave an insight into whether the show is scripted in the same New Idea interview, joking that he was responsible for delivering his killer one-liners “totally on the spot”.
“No,” he clarified. “There are talented people who help make me look good.”
As is the case with most reality TV formats, scenes on Australian Survivor are edited to deliver maximum impact.
In a 2023 interview with TV Week, three-time player Shonee Bowtell revealed that when the cameras “weren’t around”, players were unable to make any serious moves.
“So you’re not allowed to go and look for idols if there are no cameras around, because then they wouldn’t be able to show it on the show. And if there’s no cameras, we’re not even allowed to talk [to each other].”
“It’s hard-lock down [without cameras]. Everything has to be filmed, and we go from there.”
In the same interview, she also shared that fans forget Australian Survivor is an “entertainment show” and not a “documentary.”
“People will say things like, ‘Oh, why doesn’t this person ever talk at tribal council?’ They are talking, but that person isn’t in charge of editing the show together!”
“Or they’ll be like, ‘Why didn’t this person ever go look for an idol?’ It’s like, they were looking for an idol, but we can’t have a 45-minute TV show with everyone walking around the bush not finding anything.”
The editing of the show hasn’t always gone down well with contestants who have on occasion, accused producers of wrongly portraying someone as a villain.
“It can feel like a kick in the face”
After one such controversy in the Australian Survivor All Stars season in 2020, former Survivor contestant Peter Conte told 9Honey Celebrity the drama didn’t surprise him.
“As someone who’s been through it all before, it can feel like a kick in the face when key facts are omitted and storylines are warped from how events actually transpired,” Peter explained.
“This is about the cast making sure they have a voice when they feel like they’ve been silenced or made to look in a way they’re not by how the show is edited.”
In response, production company Endemol Shine issued a statement saying, “Australian Survivor is filmed 24 hours a day, seven days a week with 24 contestants talking and strategising.
“Due to the nature of the show, not everything makes it to air, but it is a true representation of what happens on the island.”
Why did Ben quit Survivor 2025?
Survivor contestant Ben Bylett confirmed that what you see is what you get on the show when he explained the reasons behind his shock exit from the 2025 season.
“Survivor is no joke. It’s a real challenge and challenging conditions,” the reality star shared on Instagram after speculation over his exit ran wild.
He explained that a calf injury that flared up after a gruelling physical challenge, combined with sickness, had forced him to leave.
“I couldn’t catch my breath for hours afterwards, and I realised something was actually pretty wrong with me. My heart rate started doing strange things, and I couldn’t take a full breath,” he revealed in an Instagram post.
The stonemason from the Sunshine Coast said it was later revealed he had “severe pneumonia” – and that wasn’t all.
“To top it off, it looks like I went on the show with bloody Ross River fever as well,” he said.
Ross River fever is a mosquito-borne viral illness that can be debilitating, especially in the early stages.
Do contestants get paid on Australian Survivor?
It’s a lot of turmoil to go through, especially given that while contestants on Australian Survivor do get paid, it’s not much at all.
“We only get paid $90 a day,” former contestant Lee Carseldine told Mamamia in February 2020.
“So, apart from trying to win it (and take home $500K), you aren’t doing it for the money. It’s a whole lot of hurt for not a lot gained if you don’t win.”
From the moment you leave your home, you have to kiss everything you know and love in the outside world goodbye – at least until your torch is snuffed.
Speaking with news.com.au in 2021, season three player Rohan MacLaren revealed that he and his fellow players were driven around in vans with blacked-out windows and weren’t allowed to communicate with their fellow competitors until they were safely stowed away in Samoa.
“It felt like I’d been abducted for the first five minutes, it was just missing the bag over my head,” he said at the time.
“Then it got quite serene. It was a nice time to sit and think. I prefer the blacked-out van. You really feel like you’re in the wild.”
Reflecting on the isolation she experienced during her time on Australian Survivor, 2023 winner Liz Parnov revealed to our sister publication TV Week just how much she struggled.
“When you are disconnected from all your friends and family and there’s no contact, it’s challenging. Just not having communication with my partner, [or] my family, it was really difficult for me. When there’s absolutely no contact, you don’t realise how much you miss people until you are in that position.”
If you get picked to play Australian Survivor, you really do go into it with just the clothes on your back, too.
“We had the clothes that we wore, and then you could only have five other items. Five other clothing items!” 2018 player Steve ‘The Commando’ Willis previously admitted to NW.
“You couldn’t take a pocket knife or a torch or a book or a pillow or any comfort items. You had your clothing items, and a little bag to carry your stuff in, and a water bottle.”
Shane Gould, who won Australian Survivor in 2018 but was the first to be eliminated in 2020’s All-Star season, also confirmed the five-item limit in an interview with Now To Love.
“What they do is you have your “first-day” clothes. So they set the scene like you’ve been on a ship or you’ve been marooned on an island, and you’ve only got the clothes that you’re wearing. And you’ve got only those clothes for three days.” Shane revealed.
“On the third day, you get five other items, so you have to choose which five items you want to take. And you have to choose wisely because they have to last you for up to 60 days in all sorts of conditions.”
Speaking with Mamamia in 2022, a Channel 10 representative did confirm that contestants are “supplied with 50+ sunscreen that is purchased and shipped from Australia.”
That same year, Blood vs Water contestant Amy Ong made the admission that island life, and stripping back everything, was actually beneficial for her.
“Because you’re eating everything natural, rice and beans, and not using any products whatsoever, everyone’s skin just thrives,” she revealed at the time.
How are the challenges on Australian Survivor created?
In a 2023 interview with Pedestrian TV, Executive Producer David Forster revealed that there was an entire team that was tasked with bringing to life the elaborate challenges that play out on screen.
“A lot of challenges we’ve taken and modified for our game as well. We’ve also invented challenges that they’ve taken as well. There’s a bit of an exchange of ideas between all [Survivor] franchises,” he shared with the publication.
Jonathan LaPaglia also told TV Week that he had tried the challenges himself over the years to have a better understanding of what the contestants were going through.
“I’ve attempted most of the challenges, particularly the trickier elements. When I’m creating commentary in the moment, it helps if I have some understanding of what the players are going through,” he said.
In a separate interview with TV Tonight, Jonathan also revealed that offscreen, the tribemates are given a safety briefing and more details about the challenge before they get started.
“The first time the contestants see the challenge -literally- is when they walk on and I’m there to greet them. The first time they hear about it is when I explain what the challenge is about,” he explained.
“Then we (stand) down, and the challenge department will then walk the players as a tribe, through the challenge. So they’ll walk along the challenge and explain to them what each part is. If something is tricky, they’ll explain that obviously, in more detail than I do.
“There’s a lot of safety stuff that needs to be communicated to the players. But that’s all they get. There’s no hands-on; they don’t get to touch any of it or practice any of it. They just get information about the steps involved and safety. Then they’re lined up and it’s off to the races.”
