Children's magician hire in Australia: the complete guide

A children's magician is running a room, not performing tricks at one. The show has to hold an audience that will announce out loud when it is bored, sit on a floor for a set number of minutes and then need something else to do. The best ones are part performer and part crowd control, and parents notice the second skill more than the first.

Live prices from the children's magicians listed here are below. The range is mostly about show length and what else comes bundled with it, because most performers in this category sell a party package rather than a bare set.

Have a look at the city figures underneath. This is one of the more affordable categories on the site because the standard booking is a show of roughly an hour at a house or a hall, rather than an evening. That also makes quotes easy to compare once you know the length.

Additions change the figure. Balloon modelling, face painting, a games segment, music, a small gift for the birthday child or a second hour all appear in packages, and two performers quoting differently are often quoting for different amounts of time in your house.

Working with children checks are handled state by state in Australia and requirements differ depending on where you are and what the setting is. Ask every performer you are considering for the current details of what they hold, and ask them to show it to you. We do not verify anybody's documents, so the check is yours to make.

Public liability cover is the other one worth asking about, especially for a school, a childcare centre or a council hall, since the venue may require it before the performer is allowed in. Request it early. A performer who provides both without fuss is telling you something about how they run their business.

Three and four year olds need short routines, big visual moments and a performer who does not mind being interrupted constantly. Five to eight is the sweet spot where a structured show really lands. By nine or ten, children want to catch the magician out, and the show needs to be clever enough to survive that scrutiny or funny enough that nobody cares.

Tell the performer the actual ages and the spread, not just the birthday child's age. A party with a mix of toddlers and ten year olds is a harder booking, and someone who knows that in advance can plan for it instead of improvising.

The usual shape is arrival and free play, then the show, then food, then cake. Putting the show first while the children are fresh works far better than trying to seat a room full of sugar. Most performers will advise on this, and their advice is worth taking because they have watched several hundred parties go right and wrong.

Think about the space too. Children sitting on a floor with the performer against a plain wall beats a big open backyard where attention leaks away. Somewhere to shut a door helps, and so does moving the dog.

What runs in the package, and for how long? What ages is it built for? What do you need from us, in terms of space, power and a place to set up? Can you send us the details of your checks and cover? And do you handle the birthday child's moment, because most do and parents want to know what it involves.

One more worth asking: what happens if the children are wild by the time you arrive. The answer tells you whether you are hiring a performer or somebody who can actually run a room.