Sydney has kicked off a wave of dazzling firework displays to welcome in 2013. Other cities from Dubai to Moscow and London will follow. Long-isolated Yangon joins the global pyrotechnics for the first time.
Australia's famous harbour city has ushered in the New Year with a $6.6 million display curated by pop icon Kylie Minogue, who designed the colour scheme and soundtrack.
"Sydney's New Year's Eve celebrations are world-famous and reach over a billion people -- not just because we have the first major display for 2013, but because it's the best," said the city's lord mayor Clover Moore.
City officials estimate more than 1.5 million people crowded the waterfront to watch the seven tonnes of fireworks go up, including crackers launched from jet-skis and a show-stopping finale on the Harbour Bridge.
Pop princess Kylie Minogue started the midnight show with the press of a button.
A giant set of red lips in the middle of the harbour bridge counted down to midnight, before the fireworks set off.
A one-of-a-kind sparkling semiquaver - to honour Kylie's 25 years in music - was one of 100,000 individual pyrotechnic creations this year, including brand new koala, octopus and hand images up in lights.
Sydney's skyline exploded in gold, pink, green and blue first at 9pm for the family-oriented curtain raiser and again at midnight.
Colours streamed from four barges situated around the harbour, with gold flashes cascading like tinsel as a gold butterfly-like design lit up the bridge.
"It was all great, amazing," said Lee Whittaker, from Denistone, who brought her kids Mel and Leon with her.
And there are plenty of tourists who come especially for the event.
American Melissa Sjostedt said she had wanted to see the fireworks on the bridge since reading about it in National Geographic 10 years ago.
"Ever since that I've always wanted to see this for real, live, in person," the 30-year-old from Florida told AAP from Dawes Point Reserve.
Mathieu Herman, 30, from New York City, said he'd made the trip to Australia specifically for New Year's Eve.
"I saw it last year on TV and it looked fabulous. I said to myself 'it's something I've just got to do'."
Across the rest of the country, other major cities hosted their own fireworks displays and parties.
More than half a million people filled the Melbourne city centre with live sites at Treasury Gardens, Flagstaff Gardens and the Docklands.
Throughout the evening, free concert at Federation Square had tens of thousands dancing away the remaining hours of 2012.
Irish sisters Emma and Sophie O'Dowd said they couldn't resist the lure of the New Year's lights and sounds, stopping at Yarra Park to see the fireworks light up the MCG on their way to a dance party.
"It's what it's all about. What a beautiful stage you've got here," Sophie, 22, said.
Surfers Paradise hosted one of Queensland's biggest New Year's Eve fireworks displays, with thousands catching a preview at the 9pm (AEST) show.
Organisers went with a superheroes theme for this year's family party, hoping to encourage children to attend as their favourite superhero and several little Spidermen and Supermen could be seen among the crowd.
In Brisbane, crowds were slightly down at South Bank, but there was still plenty of cheer as revellers waited to welcome in midnight.
Perth is partying through a heatwave, while Adelaide tried to encourage less alcohol and more family-friendly events.
Hobart hosted thousands in town for the Sydney to Hobart yacht race and Tasmania's biggest event, The Taste Festival near Salamanca Place.
AROUND THE WORLD
Sydney's midnight fireworks kick off New Year's celebrations the world over.
Fireworks will light up the Thames in London, Moscow's Red Square and Kremlin and Hong Kong's Victoria Harbour, as well as central Kuala Lumpur, Taipei, Stockholm, Amsterdam and cities across China.
Revellers in New York will celebrate the stroke of midnight with the traditional New Year's Eve ball drop over Times Square, where South Korean Internet and pop sensation Psy will join a host of US music stars.
In Rio de Janeiro, authorities have promised a bumper 16-minute, 24-tonne display opposite Copacabana Beach and fireworks will cap a mammoth party at Berlin's Brandenburg Gate featuring the Pet Shop Boys, Bonnie Tyler and Blue.
Vying to become a permanent fixture on the planetary map of New Year celebrations, the Gulf city state of Dubai is planning a lavish gala at the Burj Khalifa, the world's tallest building.
Fireworks will engulf the spike-like tower, accompanied by a soundtrack performed live by the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra.
In Paris, however, the authorities issued a reminder that all fireworks are officially banned for the night. The crowds that gather on the Champs-Elysees and around the Eiffel Tower will have to make do without any display.
Some 50,000 people are also expected to flock to the revered golden Shwedagon Pagoda in Yangon for the Myanmar city's first public countdown with fireworks, seen as further evidence of opening up after decades of junta rule.
Organisers had to campaign for months to get permission for the event from the quasi-civilian regime, which has embarked on dramatic reforms since President Thein Sein took office last year.
Hundreds of political prisoners have been released and democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi was elected to parliament after almost two decades of house arrest.
In regions devastated by Typhoon Bopha which hit the southern Philippines in early December killing at least 1,067 people, many survivors said food, work and permanent shelter topped their priorities for the New Year.
Authorities in the capital Manila are bracing for the annual rush of injuries as families celebrate with do-it-yourself firework displays and shoot celebratory bullets into the air. Hospitals were put on high alert.
Some 171 Filipinos have already been injured since the Christmas weekend including one poisoned after eating a firework.
Seoul will usher in 2013 with a ritual ringing of the city's 15th-century bronze bell 33 times, reflecting the ancient practice of marking a new year.
Elsewhere in the South Korean capital, including the glitzy Gangnam district made famous in the hit that saw Psy become a household name, there will be fireworks, concerts and street parties.
Millions of well-wishers will visit temples and shrines in Japan for "ninen-mairi" two-year prayers and gather at family homes to feast on soba noodles and watch the New Year variety show "Kohaku Uta Gassen" or the Red and White Song Contest.
Up to 40 percent of Japan's TV audience watch the four-hour programme, which features established acts and J-Pop stars.
Popular South Korean performers were left out of this year's line-up amid territorial frictions with Seoul, though taxpayer-funded broadcaster NHK insisted politics had played no part in the selection of performers.
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