High Quality Content by WIKIPEDIA articles! Metrication in Australia took place between 1970 and 1988. Before then, Australia mostly used the imperial system for measurement, which the Australian colonies had inherited from the United Kingdom. Between 1970 and 1988, imperial units were withdrawn from general legal use and replaced with SI metric units, facilitated through legislation and government agencies. SI units are now the sole legal units of measurement in Australia. Australia`s largely successful transition to the metric system contrasts with the ongoing opposition to metrication in the United States and in the United Kingdom.