Ian Smith (born 19 June 1938) is an Australian soap opera character actor, television producer and screenwriter.
Smith became best known through his portrayal of Harold Bishop in the soap opera Neighbours from 1987 to 1991, and returning in 1996. He switched to recurring status from 2008 to 2009 and his final appearance in 2015 and several appearances for the final year of Neighbours in 2022 before the series was renewed in late 2022. Smith appeared in several episodes of the rebooted Neighbours and in April 2024, Smith was confirmed to be returning to the show again.
Smith was one of the series longest serving characters in Neighbours until Stefan Dennis became the series longest standing actor.
Before appearing on Neighbours. Smith had previously acted in guest roles in drama series such as the Crawford Productions police dramas Homicide, Division 4 and Matlock Police.
He had a regular role in long-running Australian television serial Bellbird, made a guest appearance as a police detective in The Box in 1975, and had a semi-regular role as Ted Douglas in serial Prisoner and he also served as Associate Producer, editor and writer during the shows run. The role of Ted Douglas came too him when someone failed to show up to set one day during filming.
Smith semi-retired from acting in 2015 and turned to voice acting for commercials. Smith gave a rare interview with Talking Prisoner in 2023.