The ACT will ease its indoor mask rules from Friday night, despite the national capital recording its highest daily case numbers for more than a month.
From 6pm on Friday, masks will no longer be required to be worn indoors except for public transport along with high-risk settings such as hospitals, aged care facilities or prisons.
Masks will still be required for disability care workers and in-home aged care providers, as well as staff and visitors to schools and early childhood centres.
Students in years 7 to 12 will still need to wear masks if they are in indoor areas at school.
Mask rules are also in effect at Canberra Airport and on domestic flights in or out of the capital.
The new rules will bring the ACT into line with similar measures in NSW and Victoria.
The changes come despite the ACT's daily COVID-19 cases nearly doubling in the past 24 hours.
There were 946 new cases reported on Wednesday, up from 583 the day before.
ACT Health Minister Rachel Stephen-Smith said the large uptick in cases stemmed from a cluster of infections at residential halls at the Australian National University.
"We expect to see case numbers go up and down during this period," she told reporters in Canberra.
Chief health officer Dr Kerryn Coleman said case numbers would fluctuate as movement increased across Canberra.
"The numbers we're seeing now are what we might expect to see as a baseline over the next couple of months," she said.
"We have seen more cases in adults, which reflects the ANU (cluster)."
Of the new cases, 376 came from PCR tests while the remaining 570 were from rapid antigen tests.
There are now 40 COVID-19 patients who are being treated in hospital, with two of those in intensive care.
Vaccination rates for five- to 11-year-olds have risen to 77.7 per cent having received a first dose, while 65.8 per cent of those 16 and over have had their booster.
Ms Stephen-Smith said masks were still recommended in public indoor settings to reduce community transmission of COVID-19.
The health minister has urged workplaces to consider mask-wearing policies for staff, particularly those with customer-facing roles in areas like retail and hospitality.
Should there be a resurgence in case numbers, or a new variant, Dr Coleman said there was a range of measures that could be implemented, such as the return of mask mandates.
"Masks are one of the things that have proven to be a very successful and easy thing people can do," she said
Dr Coleman said the decision to ease mask use in Canberra was carefully considered following a stabilisation of case numbers.
However, she urged people to wear masks indoors should it be hard to physically distance.
The mask-wearing rules are not the only COVID-19 measures to be changing in the capital.
From 11.59pm on Friday, anyone who tests positive to a RAT must report their results to ACT Health and isolate for seven days.
Anyone who tests positive via a rapid test will be encouraged to notify their own close contacts.
From this weekend, organisers of events with more than 2000 attendees will not be required to seek an exemption if it is ticketed.
However, organisers of events with more than 5000 people will still need to submit COVID-19 safety plans to be reviewed by health authorities.
