Matrics celebrate after getting their results on 13 January, 2025. Picture: Nigel Sibanda/ The Citizen South Africa’s 2025 National Senior Certificate (NSC) results, released on Monday by Basic Education Minister Siviwe Gwarube, offer a rare combination in the country’s long-troubled education story: progress that deserves recognition, alongside warning signs that cannot be ignored. The headline figure, an 88% national pass rate, the highest in South Africa’s history, is significant.
More than 656 000 pupils passed matric, with KwaZulu-Natal topping the provincial rankings at 90.6%.For the first time, all 75 education districts achieved pass rates above 80%. But the real value of the 2025 results lies not only in how many students passed, but in how many stayed long enough to write matric in the first place. For decades, South Africa’s schooling system has been defined by what happens before matric: large numbers of learners quietly disappear between Grades 10 and 12, often due to poverty, repetition, or lack of support.
This year’s data suggests that pattern may be easing albeit unevenly. “The percentage of learners who were unable to sit for any of their exam papers has fallen sharply, from around 17% in 2017 to around 2% today,” Gwarube said. The majority of candidates were also 18 years old, pointing to improved on-time progression.
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Fewer part-time repeat candidates wrote the exams, indicating that fewer learners are trapped in prolonged cycles of failure. Civil society organisation Zero Dropout Campaign (ZDC) described the 2025 results as a “second consecutive record-breaking year” and congratulated students who reached matric “under increasingly complex and demanding circumstances”. This is not a small achievement in a system that still operates under deep structural inequality.
Yet praise must be measured. ZDC cautioned that South Africa continues to lose pupils long before matric, estimating that “four in ten students who begin Grade 1 will not matriculate or achieve an alternative qualification”. The organisation warned against equating improved pass rates with a healthy system.
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