The province in South Africa with the lowest unemployment rate
· The South African
One South African province continues to stand out from the rest when it comes to employment, recording an unemployment rate significantly below the national average.
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The Western Cape had the country’s lowest official unemployment rate in the third quarter of 2026, according to the latest Quarterly Labour Force Survey released by Statistics South Africa (Stats SA).
The province recorded an unemployment rate of 19.4% between July and September 2026.
This was considerably lower than South Africa’s national unemployment rate of 33.7% over the same period.
The Western Cape also managed to reduce its unemployment rate slightly compared with both the previous quarter and the same period last year.
How the provinces compare
The Western Cape was the only province to record an unemployment rate below 20% in the third quarter.
The Northern Cape followed with an unemployment rate of 30%, while Limpopo recorded 30.2%.
At the other end of the scale, the Eastern Cape continued to face the country’s highest unemployment rate, at 44.3%.
The provincial unemployment rates for Q3 2026 were:
ProvinceUnemployment rateWestern Cape19.4%Northern Cape30.0%Limpopo30.2%KwaZulu-Natal33.3%Gauteng35.7%Mpumalanga37.8%North West38.1%Free State39.1%Eastern Cape44.3%The national unemployment rate stood at 33.7%.
Western Cape employment figures continue to improve
The province’s comparatively low rate was accompanied by an increase in the number of employed people.
Stats SA recorded approximately 2.88 million employed people in the Western Cape during the third quarter of 2026.
This represented an increase of 48 000 compared with the previous quarter.
Year-on-year, the province added 69 000 employed people, making it the only province to record an increase in employment compared with the same period in 2025.
The province’s official rate also declined from 19.5% in Q2 2026 to 19.4% in Q3.
Compared with the third quarter of 2025, the rate decreased by 0.3 percentage points.
South Africa’s wider unemployment problem
Although the Western Cape recorded the country’s lowest rate, the national employment situation remains challenging.
South Africa’s overall unemployment rate increased from 33.6% in the second quarter of 2026 to 33.7% in the third quarter.
The number of unemployed people increased by 97 000 to approximately 8.58 million.
Employment increased by 101 000 during the same period, bringing the total number of employed people to 16.84 million.