South Africa’s Western Cape anchors itself as continent’s primary cruise destination

The Western Cape, South Africa’s tourism hub and home to one of its legislative capitals, Cape Town, has cemented its position as Africa’s leading cruise destination following a record-breaking 2024/25 season.

Between November, 2024 and June, 2025 an unprecedented 145,000 cruise passengers and crew arrived across Cape Town and Mossel Bay, aboard 83 cruise calls.

Cape Town welcomed 22 cruise calls in March alone, the port’s busiest month on record, while Mossel Bay continued to grow as a secondary port of call, hosting 15 ship visits and expanding the reach of cruise tourism beyond the metropolitan hub.

The season generated an estimated R1.2 billion for the Western Cape economy, supporting growth of more than 2,000 jobs across tourism, transport, food and beverage, and related sectors. 

A key milestone in the season was the maiden visit to the continent of Cunard Line’s Queen Anne on April 10th, 2024, signalling growing interest from the luxury cruise segment, particularly cruise lines operating world cruises and grand voyages. 

This follows increased seasonal deployments by major cruise lines including MSC Cruises, the market leader in the South African cruise sector, as well as Norwegian Cruise Line and AIDA Cruises, whose vessels frequently use Cape Town as a turnaround port.

Tourism officials have described the season as a major step towards the Western Cape’s broader tourism goal of doubling visitor numbers by 2035. 

Cruise tourism’s knock-on effects are already being felt beyond Cape Town, with smaller towns along the Garden Route experiencing increased demand for shore excursions and local experiences. 

As the industry matures, officials hope to spread the economic benefits more evenly across the province.

According to Wesgro, the regional tourism and investment promotion agency, the success of the season highlights the long-term potential of cruise tourism as a core pillar of the province’s economic strategy.

Contributing to this growth is the Cruise Cape Town initiative, a public–private partnership involving Wesgro, the Western Cape Government, the City of Cape Town, Transnet National Ports Authority, and the V&A Waterfront. 

The partnership has prioritised infrastructure upgrades, streamlined disembarkation processes, and international promotion to position Cape Town as a homeport for global cruise lines.

It’s a model that has yet to be replicated elsewhere in South Africa, including Durban, where cruise infrastructure investment stagnated for decades until MSC Cruises contributed in large part to the development of the new Nelson Mandela Cruise Terminal.

Durban remains the country’s primary roundtrip cruise port for the local market, with MSC Cruises operating a seasonal range of itineraries annually, but the port has struggled to position itself as a viable alternative to Cape Town for international cruise tourism.