Average salary in South Africa: ZAR 5,500 a month (ILOSTAT, 2020)
Median monthly earnings of employees in South Africa: ZAR 5,500 a month (2020, ILOSTAT). By occupation, professionals earn the most and skilled agricultural, forestry and fishery workers the least.
ILOSTAT reports median monthly earnings of employees of ZAR 5,500 a month for 2020 (ILOSTAT EAR_EMTM_SEX_OCU_NB (HIES - National Income Dynamic Survey), 2020). A median is the midpoint: half of employees earn less.
The occupation split (ILOSTAT EAR_EMTM_SEX_OCU_NB, 2020) runs from ZAR 17,000 a month for professionals to ZAR 1,262 for skilled agricultural, forestry and fishery workers. These are broad ISCO-08 groups, not individual job titles.
South Africa shows about 3.2% CPI in 2025 (World Bank Open Data), with GDP per capita about US$6,598. We do not yet publish role-level medians for South Africa, so there are no per-job pages here.
What we can say about pay in South Africa today
Treat ZAR 5,500 a month as a national reference point, not an offer benchmark. Official averages blend every sector, age, and hours pattern. Compare a real offer with the occupation group that matches it, then run the take-home and cost of living calculators.