List of South African provinces by Human Development Index explained

This is a list of the provinces of South Africa by Human Development Index as of 2021.^[1]

Rank	Province	HDI (2021)
High human development
1	Western Cape	0.751
2	Gauteng	0.736
3	Limpopo	0.714
–	(average)	0.713
4	Free State	0.712
5	KwaZulu-Natal	0.710
6	Northern Cape	0.701
Medium human development
7	Mpumalanga	0.678
8		0.676
9	Eastern Cape	0.675

Historical data^[2]

Province	1990	1995	2000	2005	2010	2015	2020
Western Cape	0.711	0.745	0.705	0.689	0.717	0.753	0.766
Gauteng	0.696	0.729	0.692	0.681	0.714	0.741	0.750
Free State	0.648	0.677	0.646	0.637	0.672	0.714	0.726
Limpopo	0.598	0.623	0.604	0.612	0.663	0.715	0.727
KwaZulu-Natal	0.589	0.615	0.594	0.604	0.656	0.710	0.724
Northern Cape	0.625	0.654	0.624	0.618	0.655	0.702	0.715
Mpumalanga	0.609	0.635	0.610	0.608	0.649	0.683	0.692
North West	0.626	0.654	0.624	0.615	0.648	0.681	0.690
Eastern Cape	0.581	0.606	0.583	0.586	0.631	0.677	0.688
South Africa	0.632	0.661	0.633	0.632	0.675	0.716	0.727

Notes and References

1. Web site: Sub-national HDI - Area Database - Global Data Lab. hdi.globaldatalab.org. en.
2. Web site: Sub-national HDI - Area Database - Global Data Lab. hdi.globaldatalab.org. en.