On the strength of Saturday's showing, Hamilton's rivals will have to hope his love-hate relationship with Albert Park extends for another year.

"Coming from winter testing we had no idea where we would be," Hamilton said.

"The guys at the factory have been working so hard. I'm shaking, it was so close out there. It's great to see the top 16-17 so close."

Hamilton's teammate Valtteri Bottas, who played second-fiddle at Mercedes last year after not winning a race while Hamilton took 11 victories, was just 0.112secs adrift after taking provisional pole before Hamilton's late improvement.

While Mercedes were exultant, Ferrari was left crestfallen after its pre-season pace from testing in Barcelona proved to be a false dawn. Sebastian Vettel was third on the grid, but light years behind his long-time title foe Hamilton, the German finishing over seven-tenths of a second adrift.

New Ferrari teammate Charles Leclerc was fifth and nearly a full second behind Hamilton, the two Ferraris split by a last-gasp lap by Red Bull's Max Verstappen, who slotted his Honda-powered machine into fourth place, but half a second from pole.

"I am not worried too much but I would have loved it to be the other way around," Vettel said, saying he felt confident he could turn the tables in the race.

"Mercedes are the clear favourites, but we are here to race and we have a good car."

For Verstappen's former teammate, Australian Daniel Ricciardo, qualifying came to an agonising end, the Renault driver missing the final top-10 shootout for pole by just 0.038secs, meaning he'll start Sunday's 58-lap race from 12th on the grid. The 29-year-old was out-paced by new teammate Nico Hulkenberg by 0.008secs, but there were few smiles at Renault after last year's fourth-best team failed to have one of its drivers make Q3.

Mercedes and midfield team Haas were the only teams to not switch one or both drivers over the off-season, while new rules brought in for 2019 mandating wider, higher front wings and more simplified rear wings hoped to reduce downforce and make the cars slower, and easier for drivers to follow one another in an attempt to overtake. Ferrari estimated before the pre-season that cars would initially be slowed by 1.5secs per lap as the teams got their heads around regulations, but nobody clearly told Mercedes, Hamilton's pole lap was nearly seven-tenths of a second faster than the fastest lap of the 5.3km Albert Park layout he set in qualifying 12 months ago.

While Hamilton's lap confirmed theories that Mercedes had been keeping its powder dry in pre-season testing, Vettel and Ferrari could take some solace in the fact that race day is what counts, and the Scuderia has shone on Sundays in Australia for the past two years, Vettel winning both races.

Last year's race featured just five on-track overtakes in 58 laps, suggesting that winning pole is more than half the battle, but Vettel jumped Hamilton in the pits during a mid-race safety car period to steal his fourth victory in Australia.

Ricciardo, like his former Red Bull teammate Vettel, will be pinning his hopes on race day, and his Melbourne history suggests he has reason to be optimistic. In every race he's completed at home, he's finished ahead of where he started, and Renault's encouraging long-run pace in Friday practice should see him aiming for solid points in his first race for a new team in six years.

"I knew it was going to be close, but I did believe we'd have the pace for Q3," Ricciardo said.

"I don't know how deep we could have got into that top 10, but it was half a tenth [of a second] to get into Q3, and that was in the car. I lost it in the first sector, so I was more frustrated with myself because I knew it was there. It would have been nice. I don't think 12th represents where we are.

"If I don't qualify as well as I think I can, I tend to carry a little bit of a chip on my shoulder for the race, and it normally helps me out. I'll use this fuel for tomorrow."