Tide turning for Cape Town Jewish population

While there is a perception that the South African Jewish community is in a rapid population decline, new data from the Kaplan Centre for Jewish Studies and Research shows the Cape Town Jewish community may be bucking this trend. 

The community has seen an uptick in births after a period of historic lows, an improvement in the birth-to-death ratio, a slowing in the pace of natural population decline, and a levelling out of numbers, with an increase in semigration from other regions. 

This is detailed in the newly released 2026 Cape Town Jewish Community Demographic Report, based on data from 2002 to 2025. The centre, based at the University of Cape Town, collected data from Jewish community organisations like schools and shuls, and therefore cannot share the actual data publicly. However, Kaplan Centre research officer Reviva Hasson shared the key findings with the SA Jewish Report. 

Based on the community’s communal register, previous population estimates, and the 2019 Jewish Community Survey, the number of Cape Town Jews appears to have remained broadly stable at around 13 500 people. 

“The Kaplan Centre prepared this report to consolidate communal data about the Cape Town Jewish community,” says Hasson, who spearheaded the project. “Our objective is to equip decisionmakers with an overview of the demographic landscape of the Cape Town Jewish community, thereby supporting informed planning and strategic decision-making in the best interests of the community.” 

Hasson says the centre recognised that there had been relatively little comprehensive quantitative research on the Cape Town Jewish community since earlier studies. “We wanted to develop an evidence-based understanding of the community’s demographic trends. The project aimed to move beyond anecdote and provide reliable trends on key demographic information.” 

According to the research, births increased substantially in 2024 and 2025, following two years of historic lows. These lows may have been a result of weddings being delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The years 2024 and 2025 saw about 76 births a year, following a two-year period of 45 births a year. However, this rebound is still below long-term levels. For example, in the period 2005-2010, there were around 110 births a year. 

“While births are still well below long-term levels, this rebound suggests a potential turning point in the demographic trajectory,” says Hasson. 

The community continues to experience more deaths than births, but the increase in births means the pace of natural population decline has slowed over the past two years. The death-to-birth ratio improved from 5:1 (2021-2023) to 3:1 (2024-2025). “This represents the most important demographic improvement in the current demographics,” says Hasson. 

During the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, in 2021, the Cape Town Jewish community experienced 310 deaths. In the years since, “we are averaging 208 deaths per year, which is similar to the four-year period pre-COVID-19”. 

Hasson says that although the number of weddings has recovered from pandemic lows to around 50 a year, they are still significantly below the average of 70 weddings a year two decades ago, the 2002 to 2010 period. “The long-term significance is that fewer marriages generally translate into fewer births and a slower rate of natural population replacement,” says Hasson. 

However, migration indicators show a shift from net loss to relative equilibrium. School-based migration data suggest inflows and outflows are roughly balanced. “There is strong evidence of semigration to the Cape,” says Hasson. The ratio of pupils arriving from elsewhere in the country to every pupil leaving has increased from an average of 2.5 pupils for the years 2020-2022, to 6.5 pupils for the period 2023-2025. 

While antisemitism has skyrocketed in the wake of 7 October, South Africans have still chosen to join the Jewish community in Cape Town. The year 2025 saw 40 conversions, the highest number since 2009. 

Hasson says one explanation for the increase in births is that young couples and young families are choosing to remain in Cape Town. Another plausible explanation is that the increase in births is the result of semigration to Cape Town by singles and young couples. 

“This semigration trend has been widely observed anecdotally for many years, but is only observable in the dataset at the point when these migrants to Cape Town engage with the formal institutions in the community, such as the Beth Din when needing a mohel. Another possibility is that there has been a lagged effect from delayed weddings during the COVID-19 pandemic,” she says. 

Marriage numbers have been declining for more than two decades. “The reasons are likely multifaceted: a smaller pool of young adults due to historic migration, later marriage ages, and broader social changes that are reducing marriage patterns in many societies,” says Hasson. 

She explains that migration decisions are driven by a combination of economic, political, family, lifestyle, and ideological considerations. “Growing antisemitism internationally may be one factor that causes some people to reassess overseas destinations, but it would be simplistic to view it as the sole explanation,” says Hasson. 

“Emigration, certainly to Australia and probably other Western English-speaking countries, has been on the decline since 2009, and is a result of many factors, from the increasingly tighter immigration policies in the respective destination countries to the declining ZAR exchange rate and the implications for cost-of-living/quality-of-life assessments abroad.” 

The other side of the migration equation is semigration, mostly from Johannesburg. “Semigration is certainly a boost to the Cape Town population,” says Hasson. “In 2019, a Kaplan Centre survey reported that South African Jews found Cape Town to be the preferred destination for those considering relocating within the country.” 

For some households, “semigration may represent a middle path: they can address concerns about lifestyle or governance without facing the financial, cultural, and emotional costs associated with emigrating overseas”. 

Hasson gives the sober assessment that the Cape Town Jewish community is expected to shrink even if net migration is zero. This is due to the number of deaths being greater than the number of births. 

However, “the encouraging finding from this study is that the pace of natural population decline has slowed over the past two years.” 

Hasson says a similar survey can “absolutely” be conducted in Johannesburg. 

Such research would be especially valuable because Johannesburg is home to the country’s largest Jewish population, and robust data would help communal organisations plan for future educational, welfare, and religious needs, and be able to assess the infrastructure requirements for the community. 

For Hasson, communal leadership is best served by understanding its community through evidence rather than assumptions. “Each of us experiences only a small part of communal life, and personal experience, while valuable, inevitably provides a limited perspective.” 

By systematically collecting and analysing communal data, as the Kaplan Centre has done in the Cape Town Jewish Community Demographic Report, “we widen the lens”. 

“This enables us to identify the broader demographic and social patterns shaping the community, make informed decisions, and plan strategically for the well-being and sustainability of future generations.”