Business & Markets · Lending interest rate · South Africa
South Africa’s lending interest rate fell to 10.7% in 2025.
10.7%
2025
Down 0.94 pp from 2024.
Updated 8 Oct 2026
In plain words
10.7%
What it is. The lending interest rate is the rate banks charge private sector borrowers for short and medium term financing. It reflects the central bank's policy stance plus a margin for borrower risk and bank costs. It covers bank loans only, so bond markets, informal credit and the price of any single product such as a mortgage or a credit card sit outside it.
Neither way is good in itself. A lower rate makes credit cheaper for households and firms and cuts what savers and lenders earn. A higher rate reverses that. The latest figure, for January 2025, is 10.7%, down from 11.6% a year earlier, a fall of 0.94 percentage points. Since 2016 the rate has ranged from 7% in January 2021 to 11.6% in January 2024. The current level therefore sits in the upper part of that range, and the past year has moved it away from the peak.
Why it matters. At 10.7%, a firm borrowing to buy stock or equipment pays far more in interest than it did when the rate was 7% in January 2021. Households with variable rate debt face the same higher cost. The easing since January 2024 gives borrowers some relief, and the next annual readings will show whether the rate keeps falling from 11.6%.
| Period | Lending interest rate · South Africa |
|---|---|
| 2016 | 10.5% |
| 2017 | 10.4% |
| 2018 | 10.1% |
| 2019 | 10.1% |
| 2020 | 7.7% |
| 2021 | 7% |
| 2022 | 8.8% |
| 2023 | 11.5% |
| 2024 | 11.6% |
| 2025 | 10.7% |
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0) · Licence: CC BY 4.0
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Strata-AF™ Data, Lending interest rate, South Africa, 2025; source World Bank, World Development Indicators (CC BY 4.0), retrieved 8 Oct 2026; https://data.strata-af.com/business/lending-rate/south-africa
Data insights · Worked out from the published figures
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Working this out from the published figures…
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Methodology
Bank rate that usually meets the short- and medium-term financing needs of the private sector. Unit: %.
Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators (series FR.INR.LEND), retrieved through the World Bank API and published under CC BY 4.0. Updated annually; the World Bank's own source notes apply.