Religion in South Africa is dominated by various branches of Christianity, which collectively represent over 85% of the country's total population.
South Africa is a secular state with a diverse religious population. Its constitution guarantees freedom of religion. Many religions are represented in the ethnic and regional diversity of the country's population.
History A diverse array of African Traditional Religions practiced by the early Khoisan and later Bantu speakers was present in the region before contact with European seafarers and settlers.
The earliest symbols of Christianity in southern Africa were crosses planted along the coast by early Portuguese seafarers. With the establishment of a Dutch trading post at the Cape of Good Hope in 1652, Christianity gained a permanent foothold and converted indigenous people. This was reinforced by the arrival of the French Huguenots shortly thereafter. After the British occupations of the Cape in 1795 and 1806, this Christian tradition prevailed.
During the twentieth century, the majority of people of European descent were Christian Protestants.
Islam was introduced by the Cape Malay slaves of the Dutch settlers, Hinduism was introduced by the indentured labourers imported from the Indian subcontinent, and Buddhism was introduced by both Indian and Chinese immigrants. Jewish settlers began to arrive in significant numbers only from the 1820s.
The Baháʼí Faith was introduced to South Africa in 1911. The Baháʼí community decided to limit membership in its national assembly to black adherents when a mixed-race assembly was prohibited under apartheid. As of 2010, it had the world's ninth largest population of Baháʼís, with nearly 240,000 members.
The socially marginalized African Traditional Religion adherents have become more publicly visible and organised in a democratic post-apartheid South Africa and today number over 6 million, or approximately 15 percent of the population.
Demographics
2022 Census ProvinceChristianityTraditional AfricanNo religionIslamHinduismOtherWestern CapeEastern CapeNorthern CapeFree StateKwaZulu-NatalNorth WestGautengMpumalangaLimpopoTotal85.3%7.8%3.1%1.6%1.1%1.1%
EthnicityChristianityTraditional AfricanNo religionIslamHinduismOtherBlack AfricanColouredIndian/AsianWhite
Other Censuses The Census 2001 provided the most recent national statistics for religious denominations. Select all 26 religions, click "Continue". The Census 2011 form did not include any questions about religion due to low priority. The 2016 Community Survey, and intercensal survey carried out by Statistics South Africa, reintroduced the religion question, and the results were reported in the pie chart.
ReligionDenomination19962001%2016 %Adherents%Adherents%Adherents%ChristianSubtotal30,051,00875.535,765,25179.843,423,71778.0Dutch Reformed churches3,527,0758.93,005,6986.7Zion Christian churches3,867,7989.74,971,93211.1Catholic churches3,426,5258.63,181,3367.1Methodist churches2,808,6497.13,305,4047.4Pentecostal/Charismatic churches2,204,1715.53,422,7497.6Anglican churches1,600,0014.01,722,0763.8Apostolic Faith Mission1,124,0662.8246,1900.5Lutheran churches1,051,1932.61,130,9872.5Presbyterian churches726,9361.8832,4951.9iBandla lamaNazaretha454,7601.1248,8240.6Baptist churches439,6801.1691,2371.5Congregational churches429,8681.1508,8251.1Orthodox churches33,6650.142,2510.1Other Apostolic churches3,517,059 8.8 5,609,07012.5Other Zionist churches2,159,2575.41,887,1474.2Ethiopian type churches800,8972.0880,4142.0Other Reformed churches386,4561.0226,4950.5Other African independent churches229,0380.6656,6441.5Other Christian churches1,263,9143.23,195,4777.1Non-ChristianSubtotal1,369,9863.41,676,3913.75,472,2099.8Other non-Christian religions193,8300.5269,2000.61,513,8992.7Islam553,5851.4654,0641.5892,6851.7Hinduism537,4281.4551,6691.2561,2681.0African Traditional Religion17,0850.0125,9030.32,454,8874.4Judaism68,0580.275,5550.249,4700.1No religion/not statedSubtotal8,385,603 21.17,378,13716.56,754,79212.1No religion4,638,897 11.7 6,767,165 15.1 6,050,43410.9Not stated 3,746,7069.4610,9711.4704,3581.3Total39,806,59710044,819,77810055,650,718100
Other estimates A 2012 Win-Gallup International Religiosity and Atheism poll indicated that the share of South Africans who consider themselves religious declined from 83% in 2005 to 64% in 2012. However, an Ipsos Mori Poll of 2017 showed 88% declare that religion was an important part of their lives.
A 2015 study estimated that some 6,500 believers from a Muslim background have converted to Christianity, and numbers have increased recently.
The Association of Religion Data Archives (relying on World Christian Trends) estimated in 2010 that 82.0% of South Africans identified as Christian, 7.1% identified with indigenous religions, 5.4% identified as agnostic, 2.4% identified as Hindu, 1.7% identified as Muslim, 0.5% identified as Baháʼí, 0.3% each identified as Buddhist and atheist, 0.2% identified as Jewish, and less than 0.1% identified with each other group.
According to the World Values Survey, between 1981 and 2001, South Africa was one of only three societies to experience an increase in religious participation, and it was the leader among these, with churchgoing rising by 13% over that period, from 43% to 57% of respondents.
In South Africa today, 85.3% of the population identifies as Christian. StatSchriA data has provided that Northern Cape, 97.9%, and Free State, 95.5%, provinces have the highest percentage of Christians. In addition, the General Household Survey has found that 56.4% of people who identify as Christian rapport to church weekly. The 2023 Ipsos survey found that 54% of South Africans were Protestants.
Christianity
Christianity is the dominant religion in South Africa, with 85.3% of the population in 2022 professing to be Christian. No single denomination predominates; mainstream Protestant churches, Pentecostal churches, African-initiated churches, and the Catholic Church each have significant numbers of adherents. Importantly, there is substantial and sustained syncretism with African Traditional Religion among most of the self-professed Christians in South Africa. Of the total national population of 62 million, 52.8 million or 85.3% identified as members of a Christian denomination.
Zion Christian Church
The Zion Christian Church (or ZCC) is the largest African-initiated church in Southern Africa. The church's headquarters are located in Zion City, Moria, Limpopo Province, South Africa (Northern Transvaal).
According to the 1996 South African Census, the church numbered 3.87 million members. By the 2001 South African Census, its membership had increased to 4.97 million members. (More recent official statistics are unavailable, since the last South African Census – 2011 – did not ask any questions about religious affiliation.)
Protestantism
The history of Protestantism in South Africa dates back to the initial European settlement on the Cape of Good Hope in 1652. Since then, Protestantism has been the predominant religion among European settlers and, today, among South Africans as a whole. The largest Protestant denomination in the country is Pentecostalism, followed by Methodism, Dutch Reformed, and Anglicanism.
Influence of Christianity in Post-apartheid Dispensation According to the General Household Survey published in 2015, 86% of the South African population identifies as Christian. This could be rooted in the Christian church giving a blessing to the system of apartheid that made its early projects proud of their Christian identity. That led to the Christian faith's competition to suffer under the apartheid: people were persecuted, rituals and traditions were disrupted, and lands were taken away from people. This history indicates that there is a strong trust toward Christianity, which is still evident today as a high percentage of people still identify as somewhat associated with the religion.
Catholicism
The Catholic Church in South Africa is part of the universal Catholic Church composed of the Roman Rite and 23 Eastern Rites, of which the South African church is under the spiritual leadership of the Southern African Catholic Bishops Conference and the pope based in Vatican City. It is made up of 26 dioceses and archdioceses plus an apostolic vicariate.
In 1996, there were approximately 3.3 million Catholics in South Africa, accounting for 6% of the total population. Currently, there are 3.8 million Catholics.GCatholic.org 2.7 million are of various black African ethnic groups, such as Zulu, Xhosa, and Sotho. Coloured and white South Africans each account for roughly 300,000.Catholics in RSA 1996 census statistics posted on the website of the Archdiocese of Bloemfontein. Most white Catholics are English speaking. The majority are descended from Irish and Italian immigrants. Many others are Portuguese settlers who left Angola and Mozambique after they became independent in the 1970s, or their children. The proportion of Catholics among the predominantly Calvinist white Afrikaans speakers, or South African Indians, is extremely small.
Minority religions Islam
Islam in South Africa is a minority religion, practised by less than 1.6% of the total population, according to estimates. It has grown in three phases. The first phase brought the earliest Muslims as part of the involuntary migration of enslaved people, political prisoners, and political exiles from Africa and Asia (mainly from the Indonesian archipelago) that lasted from about 1652 to the mid-1800s. The second phase was the arrival of Indians as indentured laborers to work in the sugar-cane fields in Natal between 1860 and 1868, and again from 1874 to 1911. Of the approximately 176,000 Indians of all faiths who were transported to the Natal province, almost 7-10% of the first shipment were Muslims.
The third phase, following the end of apartheid, has been marked by the wave of African Muslims who have arrived on the shores and borders of South Africa. Recent figures estimate the number as between 75,000 and 100,000. Added to this are a considerable number of Muslims from India and Pakistan who have arrived as economic migrants. Although, the majority of South African Muslims are Sunni, smaller numbers are Ahmadi, particularly in Cape Town.
The Auwal (Owal) Mosque, built in 1794, is a mosque in the Bo-Kaap neighbourhood of Cape Town, South Africa. It is recognised as the first mosque established in the country. It is also believed that Sheikh Yusuf of Macassar was the first person to introduce the Quran in South Africa.
Hinduism
Hinduism is found in various provinces of South Africa, but primarily in KwaZulu-Natal. Approximately 1.92% of the South African population, or 651,609, identified as Hindu, according to the 2021 census. This is the largest concentration of Hindus in Africa after Mauritius.