Real-time telemetry data from a national network of solar and battery systems recorded 91 934 unique grid power outages across South Africa in 2025.
This is according to research by MultiChoice-backed renewable energy start-up, Wetility, which notes South Africans still lose power six to nine times a month even without load-shedding.
Eskom recently announced its generation fleet continues to show sustained improvement, with the energy availability factor (EAF) remaining above the 65% mark, currently at 65.31% for the financial year to date (1 April 2025 to 5 March 2026).
It says this upward momentum reflects ongoing progress in restoring power station reliability, reinforcing system stability and advancing Eskom’s operational recovery.
The generation fleet also achieved or exceeded the 70% EAF milestone on 78 occasions this financial year, reflecting sustained operational gains, it notes.
According to Eskom, between 27 February and 5 March 2026, average unplanned outages recorded at 8 146MW showing a notable improvement from the 15 275MW experienced during the same week last year, a reduction of 7 129MW, equivalent to a 46.7% decrease.
South Africa has now experienced over 300 consecutive days without an interruption in supply, with only 26 hours of load-shedding recorded in April and May 2025, during this financial year.
Not so simple
However, Wetility says a new national dataset tells a more complex story – while load-shedding has receded, the lived experience of unreliable power has not.
The Wetility 2025 Energy Resilience Report, based on real-time telemetry from a national network of solar and battery systems, recorded widespread grid power outages across South Africa in 2025.
The company notes these are primarily unplanned interruptions that shut down shops, spoil stock and leave households without warning or recourse.
In effect, Wetility says South Africa has stabilised generation, but reliable end-to-end delivery often has gaps.
At a national level, it notes, Eskom’s recovery is evident, as generation has stabilised, load-shedding has dropped sharply and key performance indicators have improved.
But electricity systems do not end at the power plant, says Wetility. Between generation and the end-user lies a complex, ageing and increasingly strained distribution network, one that is far less visible and less well-measured, it explains.
Wetility systems detect grid failures and measure whether electricity actually reaches homes and businesses reliably, across the generation, transmission and distribution chain. Considering the reduction in load-shedding, what it may be revealing is a growing disconnect between power generated and power delivered, says the firm.
“We are now seeing two parallel trends,” says Ikenna Oguguo, group president of Wetility. “One where generation is improving and another where there are many localised failures. For customers though, that distinction is less important, because the only reality that matters is whether the lights stay on.”
The Wetility data shows that, on average, households experienced six to nine grid outages per month in 2025. During this time, solar systems provided backup power and enabled South Africans to avoid interruption.
“If you had no solar system, it meant an average of 73 to 132 hours without grid power every month,” says Wetility.
Hours in the dark
One of the report’s most significant findings is the duration. More than half of all outages (58.1%) lasted longer than eight hours. The average outage lasted 12.1 hours and fewer than a quarter were resolved within two hours, the study shows.
Performance varied dramatically by region. The average outage duration differed by a factor of 2.1× across provinces, from 14 hours in Gauteng, to 6.6 hours in the Eastern Cape. These are not marginal differences, says Wetility.
“A household in Gauteng faces a fundamentally different energy reality than one in the Eastern Cape,” says Oguguo. “When we designed systems for load-shedding, we were solving for short, scheduled gaps. That era is over. The outages households face today are longer, less predictable and vary by region. Our design philosophy has to evolve with that reality.”
Outages were recorded every month of 2025 across all nine provinces. February was the most severe month nationally, with households experiencing an average of 8.8 outages and 131.8 hours without grid power, which coincides with a month that involved both load-shedding and non-load-shedding outages, the data reveals. However, no month was outage-free.
According to Wetility, this persistence and the long outage durations suggest that outages may no longer be primarily driven by generation constraints, but by deeper structural issues in the distribution network, including ageing infrastructure, municipal maintenance backlogs, cable theft and equipment failure.
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