Tracking South Africa’s holiday movements

Coastal towns were again South Africa’s preferred holiday destination in December 2024, with petrol station stops on the country’s major national roads connecting the interior with the seaside towns significantly up on pre-season activity.

While many headed for the ocean for their Christmas break, four of the top ten large malls in terms of dwell time were in Gauteng, suggesting many of those who stayed at home headed for their favourite shopping mall in the run up to Christmas.

These insights emerge from aggregated and anonymised telemetry data made available to Lightstone by Tracker. These insights compared October and December 2024 data.

Getting to the coast

Service station stops increased by 5% when comparing October to December in 2024.

If we look at service stations on the national highways as a proxy for traffic flows, the stops on roads linking the interior to the coast, and the coastal roads themselves, were busiest.

The N1 – which links Cape Town to Beit Bridge via Bloemfontein, Johannesburg and Pretoria – was up 29% when comparing October to December, while service station stops on the N3 – which links Johannesburg to Durban via Harrismith – were up 46%.

The N2, which runs along South Africa’s southern and eastern seaboards, from Cape Town to Ermelo, via George, East London, Mthatha, Durban and Empangeni, was up 19%, while the N4 was up 14%. The N4 runs from Lobatse in Botswana via Pretoria and Mbombela to Maputo in Mozambique.

The N12 – from George to Johannesburg and eMalahleni via Oudtshoorn, Beaufort West, Kimberly and Potchefstroom – increased by just 4% while the N14, which connects Springbok to Pretoria via Upington and Krugersdorp, fell by 17%.

Traffic to the country’s three main airports also tells a story, with 530k visits to OR Tambo International Airport from 12-31 December, 460k to Cape Town International Airport and 190k to King Shaka International Airport.

Favoured destinations

So, where were the holiday makers going to?

When it comes to numbers, eight of South Africa’s top 15 preferred holiday destinations visited over December were in the Western Cape, with four in KwaZulu-Natal and three in the Eastern Cape.

Top 15 in numbers

The Western Cape’s Mossel Bay and nearby Groot Brakrivier led the way, with surfer paradise Jeffreys Bay next, followed by long-time favourite Plettenberg Bay and the increasingly popular Stilbaai and nearby Groot-Jongensfontein.

But which towns experienced the largest percentage increases measured against the usual permanent population?

Buffalo Bay outside Knysna and Nature’s Valley near Plettenberg Bay saw their population explode over the holiday season. Thirteen of the 15 towns which experienced these seasonal booms were in the Western Cape, with two in the Eastern Cape.

Three towns – Stilbaai and Groot-Jongensfontein, Struisbaai and Kenton-on-Sea made both lists.

As might be expected, those living in coastal provinces – Eastern Cape, KwaZulu-Natal and the Western Cape – were less inclined to travel inland (see graph below) than those from the interior were in traveling to the coast.

Visits outside of own province

Retail therapy

South Africa’s largest malls – those with more than 70 000sqm GLA – attracted 25% more vehicle visits in December compared to October, and they spent more than 39% more time at the mall.

Shoppers spent 82% more time at Baywest Mall, situated just off the N2 in Port Elizabeth, in December compared to October, Gateway Theatre of Shopping in Umhlanga was second with a 65% increase.

Of the top ten (see table below), four were in Gauteng, three in KwaZulu-Natal, two in the Eastern Cape and one in the Western Cape.

Malls between 40 000sqm to 70 000sqm were up 15% in visits and 23% in dwell time.

The busiest malls on Christmas Eve were Gateway Theatre of Shopping and The Pavilion- Westville, both benefiting from local and holiday traffic. Next were Gauteng’s Mall of Africa and Menlyn Park Shopping Centre, followed by Canal Walk Shopping Centre in Cape Town.

Shopping patterns over December

The graphs below show the consistency of mall visits and time spent in malls, rising towards the end of the week with Friday’s being the seven-day peak, other than the Monday and Tuesday preceding Christmas Day, and the Monday and Tuesday at month end, prior to New Year’s festivities.