The Australian sharemarket regained its winning form during the past week, rallying for the seventh week in eight, as technology stocks performed strongly.

The S&P/ASX 200 index climbed 0.1 per cent, or 6.1 points, to 5942.60 on Friday, with the move bringing weekly gains to 1.6 per cent.

On Friday. preliminary retail sales surprised with a record result for May, lifting the broader market and some of the biggest retailers. Wesfarmers climbed 1.4 per cent to $43.14.

"Preliminary retail sales data for May boosted local markets," said Jeffrey Halley, senior market analyst for Asia Pacific at OANDA.

There was some early enthusiasm for the retail sector on Friday after positive trading upgrades from homewares retailer Adairs and furniture chain Nick Scali.

Adairs shares shot up 10.5 per cent to $2.31 on Friday after store sales at the homewares and manchester retailer climbed 5.3 per cent on a like-for-like basis in the 24 weeks to June 14, while online sales surged 92.6 per cent. The results lifted group sales for the June-half to date by 27.4 per cent and growth for the year to date by 15.7 per cent.

At furniture retailer Nick Scali orders for sofas, dining suites, beds and entertainment units surged 54 per cent year-on-year in May and the first half of June as stores reopened after the lockdown. Nick Scali shares rallied 19.7 per cent to $6.88 on Friday.

Other advancers during the last trading session of the week included oil and gas giant Woodside, which rose 0.6 per cent to $21.88, as analysts speculated it could be the buyer of Chevron's one-sixth stake in the North West Shelf. Goldman Sachs said the sale could lead to greater alignment among partners in the Browse project.

Tech stocks were strong again on Friday and the sector was the best performing sector in the week, rising 7.8 per cent, as Appen climbed 14.7 per cent to $33.83, Seek rose 11.3 per cent to $21.69, while Afterpay rallied 13.2 per cent to $58.69.

Other individual weekly standout gainers included Healius which rallied 19.8 per cent to $3.03 after inking a $500 million sale of its medical centres and dental clinics to private equity group BGH Capital on Monday.

Viva was another steep weekly gainer, jumping 14.2 per cent over the five sessions to $1.80 after the owner of the former Shell refinery and petrol station network in Australia guided to underlying net profit of between $20 million to $50 million, compared to $50.9 million in the first half of 2019.

The week wasn't so positive for the mining sector. Resources were the only sector to lose ground during the week, falling 1.7 per cent, with gold miners suffering from a revival in risk appetite. Northern Star fell 4.9 per cent to $13.03 over the week.