Student rent index: what student rooms cost in South Africa

The headline numbers

Across South Africa, the median student room on DigsConnect is advertised at R6,000 a month, and the middle half of rooms sit between R4,500 and R8,150. Room type moves the price more than almost anything else: a bed in a shared room has a median of R4,500, while a studio is R10,500.

The "typical range" in each table is the 25th to the 75th percentile: half of all rooms fall inside it, a quarter are cheaper and a quarter are more expensive. Every figure is a monthly rent per person as listed.

Student rent by city

Cape Town is the most expensive big student city by a clear margin, and Stellenbosch sits above everything else. Johannesburg and Gqeberha are the cheapest places to rent as a student, with Pretoria and Durban in between. Where a city has too few rooms of one type to report honestly, the cell is marked "-".

Browse the listings behind these numbers: Cape Town, Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban, Gqeberha and Stellenbosch.

Student rent by suburb

Inside a city, the suburb matters almost as much as the room. In Cape Town the gap between Rondebosch (median R8,200) and Wynberg (R5,500) is more than R2,500 a month, even though both are on the same train line to UCT. In Pretoria, Sunnyside is roughly half the price of Menlo Park.

If you are studying at UCT and the Rondebosch numbers hurt, read our Wynberg vs Rondebosch comparison. For Pretoria, compare Hatfield listings; for Johannesburg, Auckland Park.

How to use these numbers

Use the median as your benchmark, not as a price you are owed. A room well below the typical range for its suburb and type is worth a second look: sometimes it is a bargain, sometimes the rent leaves out utilities or Wi-Fi, and sometimes it is a scam. A room well above the range should come with something extra, such as an en-suite, a shuttle, security, or everything included.

Before you pay a deposit, check what the rent includes and check that the landlord is legit. For a full monthly budget beyond rent, see what student accommodation costs in South Africa.

Methodology

The index is built from every listing live on DigsConnect on the snapshot date. We use advertised rents per person per month, not signed leases, so real deals can differ slightly. The rules we apply are the same every quarter so that editions can be compared:

• Only active rooms on listings billed monthly are included.
• Where a room has no price of its own, we use the listing price only when the listing has a single room; otherwise the room is dropped.
• Prices below R1,500 or above R25,000 a month are treated as errors and removed.
• Each listing counts once per room type (we take the median of its rooms of that type), so one large building cannot swamp a city.
• Room types: sharing = a bed in a shared bedroom; single = a private bedroom, split by whether the bathroom is shared or your own; studio = a self-contained unit.
• A city or suburb cell is published only when it has at least 8 rooms (suburbs: at least 6 rooms across 4 listings). Ranges are rounded to the nearest R50.

Next update

This is the September 2026 edition. The next edition, using listings from December 2026, will show how prices moved into the January peak, when most students sign for the new academic year. Read when to book student accommodation to see why timing matters.