How It Works

poweroutagesa is a crowd-sourced power outage tracker for South Africa. Anyone can report a power outage or restoration for their four-digit postal code, and everyone nearby can see what neighbours are reporting in real time.

1. Search your postal code or suburb

Type a postal code, suburb or municipality in the search box, or tap the location button. Every postal code in the provinces we cover has its own live page with the local electricity provider (Eskom or your municipality) and emergency numbers. We are adding provinces one by one; if your area is not listed yet, check back soon.

2. Report an outage or restoration

Tap Power is out when the lights go off and Power is back when it returns. Reports are anonymous: we don’t ask for your name, phone number or street address. To keep the data clean, each device can report the same postal code only once every few minutes.

3. Load-shedding or a fault?

Scheduled load-shedding is published by Eskom and your municipality; the load-shedding page shows the current stage and links to the official schedules. If your power is out outside your scheduled slot, it is probably a fault: report it here and to your provider.

4. How the status is calculated

When the most recent reports say the power is out, the postal code shows Outage reported once people on at least two different networks agree (one report shows Possible outage). It stays open until someone reports Power is back, or until 24 hours pass with no new outage report, when it is marked Resolved automatically. With no recent reports the page shows No recent reports, which does not prove the power is on.

5. Your provider and emergency numbers

Each postal-code page lists the electricity providers that serve the area (Eskom and/or your municipality), with their official fault-reporting numbers and websites, plus 112, 10111, 10177 and your provincial disaster management centre. In many suburbs Eskom and the municipality each supply different streets, so check your electricity bill or prepaid meter vendor. Always report outages to your provider too: this site does not notify them.

Safety first

Stay at least 10 metres away from downed power lines and call 112 (cell phone) or 10111 and your provider. Never run a generator, braai or gas heater indoors – carbon monoxide kills. If someone depends on powered medical equipment, have a backup plan and call 10177 in an emergency.