Dividends are expected to provide a greater portion of ASX investors' returns than capital growth while interest rates and inflation remain high, according to international and local experts.
The most reliable dividend payers of the ASX 200 are typically large-cap shares because they represent the biggest blue-chip companies.
The large caps have a minimum market capitalisation of $10 billion.
So, let's take a look at which ASX 200 large-cap shares are paying the best dividend yields right now.
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Woodside the best ASX dividend payer
According to data provided by TradingView, the ASX 200 large-cap shares offering the 10 best trailing dividend yields are a mix of ASX bank shares, mining shares, energy shares, and property shares.
They are:
| ASX 200 LARGE CAP SHARE | ASX DIVIDEND YIELD | PAID PER SHARE |
| Woodside Energy Group Ltd (ASX: WDS) | 10.64% | $3.75 |
| Fortescue Metals Group Ltd (ASX: FMG) | 9.83% | $1.96 |
| BHP Group Ltd (ASX: BHP) | 8.99% | $3.92 |
| South32 Ltd (ASX: S32) | 7.13% | 33 cents |
| ANZ Group Holdings Ltd (ASX: ANZ) | 6.59% | $1.55 |
| Westpac Banking Corp (ASX: WBC) | 6.34% | $1.34 |
| Stockland Corporation Ltd (ASX: SGP) | 6.16% | 27 cents |
| National Australia Bank Ltd (ASX: NAB) | 6.07% | $1.61 |
| Scentre Group (ASX: SCG) | 5.76% | 16 cents |
| APA Group (ASX: APA) | 5.36% | 54 cents |
Things to consider
If you're using this data to research which ASX dividend shares to buy, there are a couple of things to consider.
It's important to remember that trailing dividend yields are calculated by taking the most recent total annual dividend amount paid by a company and dividing it by today's share price.
Hence, trailing dividends are based on the previous year's income. Next year's income could be different depending on what is happening with each individual business.
However, large-cap ASX businesses are mature in nature and typically have longstanding dividend payout ratios in place, and they rake in fairly reliable levels of income.
Bear in mind that some ASX large-caps, like the mining shares, are 'price-takers'. This means their income is partly out of their control because global commodity prices determine how much they can sell their products for each year.
What should you do next?
Now that you know which large-caps are the biggest ASX dividend payers based on trailing payments, it's time to do some further research.
We can help.
Conduct a ticker or company name search on our website to find our ticker pages for each company.
Our ticker pages incorporate each company's latest announcements and all the articles we have published relating to that ASX share.
In our article library, you will likely find stories documenting the latest predictions from the big brokers as to the dividend amounts they expect these ASX 200 large-cap shares to pay in FY23, FY24, and even FY25.
