The long battle to save the Tasmanian devil from its deadly facial cancer is set to pass a vital milestone, with the first release into the wild of immunised animals.

The 19 captive-bred devils have all responded to a trial vaccine developed by a team at the Menzies Institute for Medical Research in Hobart, who have been fighting the disease for nearly a decade.

Healthy captive Tasmanian devils take a break. Credit:Dan Fellow

"This is huge," said David Pemberton, manager of the Save the Devil program. "It's the start of what we are calling wild devil recovery."

Dr Pemberton said the disease had now "spotted" ahead of the main front to the island's west coast and was closing on the north-west tip of Tasmania.