The University of Cape Town (UCT) (Afrikaans: Universiteit van Kaapstad, Xhosa: iYunivesithi yaseKapa) is a public research university in Cape Town, South Africa. Established in 1829 as the South African College, it was granted full university status in 1918, making it the oldest university in South Africa and the oldest university in Sub-Saharan Africa in continuous operation.

UCT is organised in 57 departments across six faculties offering bachelor's (NQF 7) to doctoral degrees (NQF 10) solely in the English language. Home to 30,000 students, it encompasses six campuses in the Capetonian suburbs of Rondebosch, Hiddingh, Observatory, Mowbray, and the Waterfront. It is the only African member of the Global University Leaders Forum (GULF) within the World Economic Forum, which is made up of 26 of the world's top universities.

Five alumni, staff members, and researchers associated with UCT have won the Nobel Prize. 88 staff members are part of the Academy of Sciences of South Africa.

The University of Cape Town was founded at a meeting in the Groote Kerk in 1829 as the South African College, a high school for young men. The college had a small tertiary-education facility, introduced in 1874 that grew substantially after 1880, when the discovery of gold and diamonds in the north – and the resulting demand for skills in mining – gave it the financial boost it needed to grow. The college developed into a fully fledged university during the period 1880 to 1900, thanks to increased funding from private sources and the government.

During these years, the college built its first dedicated science laboratories, and started the departments of mineralogy and geology to meet the need for skilled personnel in the country's emerging diamond and gold-mining industries. The UCT crest was designed in 1859 by Charles Davidson Bell, Surveyor-General of the Cape Colony at the time. Bell was an accomplished artist who also designed medals and the triangular Cape stamp. Another key development during this period was the admission of women. In 1886 the professor of chemistry, Paul Daniel Hahn, convinced the council to admit four women into his chemistry class on a trial basis. Owing to the exceptional standard of work by the women students, the college decided to admit women students permanently in honour of Queen Victoria's Diamond Jubilee in 1887.

The years 1902 to 1918 saw the establishment of the Medical School, the introduction of engineering courses and a Department of Education. UCT was formally established as a university in 1918, on the basis of the Alfred Beit bequest and additional substantial gifts from mining magnates Julius Wernher and Otto Beit. The new university also attracted substantial support from well-wishers in the Cape Town area and, for the first time, a significant state grant.

In 1928, the university was able to move the bulk of its facilities to Groote Schuur on the slopes of Devil's Peak, on land bequeathed to the nation by Cecil John Rhodes as the site for a national university. UCT celebrated its centenary the following year.

Apart from establishing itself as a leading research and teaching university in the decades that followed, UCT earned itself the nickname "Moscow on the Hill" during the period 1960 to 1990 for its sustained opposition to apartheid, particularly in higher education.

The university admitted its first small group of black students in the 1920s. The number of black students remained relatively low until the 1980s and 90s, when the institution, reading and welcoming the signs of change in the country, committed itself to a deliberate and planned process of internal transformation. From the 1980s to the early 1990s, the number of black students admitted to the university rose by 35 percent. By 2004, nearly half of UCT's 20,000 students were black and just under half of the student body was female. Today the university boasts having one of the most diverse campuses in South Africa.

Rhodes Must Fall (#RhodesMustFall on social media) was a protest movement that began on 9 March 2015, originally directed against a statue at the University of Cape Town (UCT) that commemorates Cecil Rhodes. The campaign for the statue's removal received global attention and led to a wider movement to "decolonise" education across South Africa. On 9 April 2015, following a UCT Council vote the previous night, the statue was removed.

#FeesMustFall was a student protest movement which was arguably indirectly inspired by the RhodesMustFall. It formally began at the University of the Witwatersrand and spread to UCT and Rhodes University and then the rest of the South African universities. It called for the abolition of tuition fee increases for the 2016 academic year. Diverse demands arose such as the abolition of fees and decolonisation of higher education which led to substantial changes at South African public universities. At UCT, the Senate began a widespread curriculum reform process and the university began the process of the renaming of buildings on campus (the most notable example was when Jameson Hall was renamed to Sarah Baartman Hall in 2019).

In September 2019, Film and Media studies student Uyinene Mrwetyana went missing. After the community and police began searching, her body was discovered in the Cape Flats area of Cape Town and Luyanda Botha was arrested and convicted for her rape and murder. Her death and the rape and death of other women precipitated widespread public outcry that led to a campus shutdown and protests on campus, at the Parliament precinct in Cape Town CBD and at campuses around South Africa. Subsequently, President Ramaphosa announced reforms such as harsher punishments for sex offenders and the public disclosure of the National Register for Sex Offenders to stem sexual and physical violence against women and children. Moreover, the Uyinene Mrwetyana Foundation was established and a special fund in her name was created to provide scholarships to female students in the Humanities Faculty.

In March 2020, UCT opened the Neuroscience Institute at the Groote Schuur Hospital in collaboration with the Western Cape Provincial Government, the first dedicated cross- and interdisciplinary centre for the study of and development of treatments for neurological and mental disorders in Africa.

The main teaching campus, known as Upper Campus, is located on the Rhodes Estate on the slopes of Devil's Peak. This campus contains, in a relatively compact site, the faculties of Science, Engineering, Commerce, and Humanities (except for the arts departments), as well as Smuts Hall and Fuller Hall residences. Upper Campus is centered on Sarah Baartman Hall, the location for graduation and other ceremonial events, as well as many examinations. The original buildings and layout of Upper Campus were designed by JM Solomon and built between 1928 and 1930. Since that time, many more buildings have been added as the university has grown. Upper Campus is also home to the main library, The Chancellor Oppenheimer Library, which holds the majority of the university's 1.3 million volume collection.

Contiguous with Upper Campus, but separated from it by university sports fields and the M3 expressway, are the Middle and Lower Campuses. These campuses, which are spread through the suburbs of Rondebosch, Rosebank and Mowbray, contain the Law Faculty, the South African College of Music, the School of Economics, most of the student residences, most of the university administrative offices, and various sporting facilities. The state of the art artificial grass soccer field has been approved by FIFA for training for World Cup teams. The Upper, Middle and Lower Campuses together are often referred to as the "main campus".

The Faculty of Health Sciences is located on the Medical School campus next to the Groote Schuur Hospital in Observatory. The Fine Arts and Drama departments are located on the Hiddingh Campus in central Cape Town. The university's original building, now known as the Egyptian Building, on the Hiddingh campus, was built in the Egyptian Revival style. The only other campus built in this style was the Medical College of Virginia in Richmond, Virginia in the United States. The UCT Graduate School of Business is located on the Breakwater Lodge Campus at the Victoria & Alfred Waterfront.

The Baxter Theatre Centre, located on the Lower Campus, is part of the University of Cape Town; it is also the second largest performing arts complex in Cape Town, after the Artscape Theatre Centre. It has three venues:

• the 665-seat Main Theatre
• the 638-seat Concert Hall, with a Von Beckerath organ
• the 172-seat Golden Arrow Studio

For his contribution of the tract of land which the campus was founded on, a bronze statue of Cecil Rhodes was erected in 1934 on the Upper Campus, overlooking the university's rugby fields. The statue was removed in April 2015 following pressure from student groups due to its representation of South Africa's colonialist apartheid past and the university's inadequate representation of black students, faculty, and staff.

The upper campus was affected by the Table Mountain fire in April 2021; the Jagger Library building, which housed rare books and documents including a large African Studies collection, was gutted.

The university has 19 student residences (or "res" as known colloquially), offering both single-gender and mixed-gender housing. The Department of Student Housing oversees the residence system College House is the oldest university residence in Africa, having been established in 1887. UCT's residence system is composed of three tiers. Students living in residence are placed in a tier according to the length of time that they have been in the residence system, studying in the university and service or part-time employment in a residence. As a student progresses through their academic journey they are moved into a higher tier. Postgraduate students are usually housed in the third-tier residences unless employed in lower-tier residences.

First-tier residences:

Second-tier residences:

Third-tier residences:

• 
  Smuts Hall, built in 1928 on the Upper Campus
• 
  Tugwell Hall, built in 1974 on the Lower Campus

The University of Cape Town was originally incorporated as a public university by a private act of Parliament in 1918. At present it is incorporated and structured by an institutional statute issued under the provisions of the Higher Education Act, 1997.

The titular head of the university is the chancellor; this is a ceremonial position without executive power. The primary role of the chancellor is to confer degrees on behalf of the university, and to represent the university to the rest of the world. The current Chancellor is fashion entrepreneur and philanthropist Precious Moloi-Motsepe who was elected in November 2019 and assumed the role on 1 January 2020 after the expiration of Ms Graça Machel's second consecutive 10-year term.

The University Council is the highest ranked decision-making and appointative structure in the university. With wide-ranging powers of governance over areas such as the strategy, well-being and mission of the university, it is directly accountable to the Government of the Republic through the Minister of Higher Education, currently Nobuhle Nkabane for matters relating to the university. It is composed of 30 broad stakeholder representatives such as students, academics, staff and appointees of the City of Cape Town, Convocation, Premier of the Western Cape and the Minister of Higher Education among others, and the presiding officer of the council, the chair, is currently Mr Norman Arendse (SC). The Registrar, who acts as the secretary of the Council and Senate, oversees academic registration and legal matters, and administers the Convocation, is currently Royston Pillay.

The Convocation, composed of alumni, the Vice Chancellor, Deputy Vice Chancellors, academic staff, emeritus professors and emeritus associate professors, is a statutory body administered by the Office of the Registrar, which provides a platform for former members of the university to participate and engage with matters affecting the university. Helmed by the President of the Convocation, currently Mr Kassi Carl Manlan, it can make recommendations and pass non-binding resolutions in its Annual General Meetings.

The Leadership Lekgotla is a coordinating and decision-making structure composed of senior executives of the university who oversee the day-to-day running of the university. It contrasts with the University Council which arises from the University Statute and exercises supreme governance over the university. The Leadership Lekgotla's members are senior executives who oversee different areas of the university's operations and policies.  The most senior executive is the Vice Chancellor (ranked below the Chancellor in the ceremonial protocol and order of precedence of the university) is the de facto head and chief executive of the university, (currently held by Mosa Moshabela), who is accountable to the council. Below the Vice Chancellor are the Deputy Vice Chancellors of Transformation (currently Professor Elelwani Ramugondo), of Research and Internationalisation (currently Susanne Harris) and of Teaching and Learning (currently Professor Harsha Kathard, acting). The Chief Operations Officer, currently Reno Morar, brings together and oversees the functional, support and technical areas of the university's operations.

University Chancellors & Vice-Chancellors
Chancellor		Vice-Chancellor
Term	Name & image	Term	Name
1918–1936	H.R.H. the Prince of Wales	1918–1938	Sir John Carruthers Beattie
1936–1950	General Jan Smuts	1938–1947	AW Falconer
1950–1967	The Hon. Mr Justice Albert van der Sandt Centlivres	1948–1955	TB Davie
		1956–1957	RW James, in an acting capacity
		1958–1967	Jacobus Duminy
1967–1999	Harry Oppenheimer	1968–1980	Sir Richard Luyt
		1981–1996	Stuart J Saunders
		1996–2000	Mamphela Ramphele
1999–2019	Graça Machel	2000–2008	Njabulo Ndebele
		2008–2018	Max Price
2019–present	Precious Moloi-Motsepe	2018–2023	Mamokgethi Phakeng
		2023–2024	Daya Reddy, interim
		2024-	Mosa Moshabela

The university is composed of six Faculties (Commerce, Engineering and the Built Environment, Health Sciences, Law, Sciences and Humanities) which together comprise 57 departments. Faculties are helmed by a Dean and their administrative and operational matters are administered by a Director. The Senate has delegated substantial powers to the faculties in academic matters over their internal protocol and management such as on matters concerning class timetables, admission requirements, academic exclusion, examinations, research projects and so on. Faculties vary substantially in student size and in buildings occupied, with the Commerce faculty having the highest student population and the law faculty having the lowest while the Humanities faculty spans the most buildings followed by the Faculty of Health Sciences with the Commerce and Law faculties having (by far) the lowest physical footprint.

Notwithstanding interdisciplinary research units and centers, additional academic structures exist that eschew the faculty-based organisational structure. The multidisciplinary Center for Higher Education Development ranks on an equal level as the faculties and the UCT Graduate School of Business maintains substantial latitude over its internal affairs despite being nominally part of the Faculty of Commerce. The interdisciplinary School of Information Technology, comprising the Departments of Information Systems and of Computer Science in the Commerce and Science faculties is neither a faculty nor a department but a coordinating mechanism to promote IT education and research.

The departments of the faculties are listed as follows:

Faculty of Commerce

• College of Accounting
• School of Economics (jointly established with Faculty of Humanities)
• Department of Finance and Tax
• Department of Information Systems
• The Nelson Mandela School of Public Governance
• School of Management Studies
• Education Development Unit
• Graduate School of Business

Faculty of Engineering and the Built Environment

Faculty of Health Sciences

Faculty of Humanities

Faculty of Law

• Department of Commercial Law
• Department of Private Law
• Department of Public Law

Faculty of Science

The university's endowment (the financial capital and investment funds on which it can draw to carry out its work) is deposited with the UCT Foundation (a legally independent nonprofit organisation) and it is managed by the Investment Office. Through the Distinguishing UCT fundraising campaign, the university is trying to raise its endowment. As of 2019, its designated endowment stands at R2.5 billion and its undesignated endowment stands at R676 million with R133 million raised for infrastructure projects (bringing the total undesignated endowment to R809 million which the university aims to increase to R1 billion).

There have been several campaigns at the university to divest its endowment. Fossil Free UCT was formally established in 2015 as a campaign by environmental activism lobbying groups and student organisations, most notably the Green Campus Initiative compel UCT to divest from fossil fuel companies which resulted in a non-binding resolution passed by UCT's Convocation in 2017 to support the divestment. Student lobby groups, most notably the Palestinian Solidarity Front and the SRC called on the university's management to divest from Israeli companies and organisations working in the Palestinian Occupied Territories (among other demands), which, in the end, the university refused to do.

The university's income comes from a combination of government grants, tuition fees, donations, investment and research income. In the 2017–2018 financial year, the university received R1.415 billion in state subsidies, R1.428 billion in tuition fees and R539 million in other income. R1.2 billion was committed to student financial aid for both undergraduate and postgraduate students from the university, the government through the NSFAS scheme and the university's partners and donors.

As of 2018, there were 27,907 students; 25% of whom were black South African, 22% were white South African, 18% identified as another race, 15% were international students. In 2016 there were 29,074 students enrolled (18,421 undergraduates and 10,653 postgraduates) and 4,542 staff were employed (1,179 academic and 3,363 professional, administrative, support and service staff).

The UCT Employment Equity Plan April (2010 to 2015) indicated moderate but consistent changes in the demographic makeup of the staff body. The five-year plan specified specific targets ranging from between about 5% to 10% adjustments in the representation of SA black staff. According to the plan the staff makeup would have changed by 2015 by achieving either parity or more SA black staff than SA white in all categories other than senior lecturer and professor positions.

UCT spokesperson Elijah Moholola noted that, in 2017, UCT employed 45 white professors, 38 black African, Cape Coloured or Indian South African professors, 67 foreign national professors and 7 who did not disclose their race.

Student enrolment by population group 2009–2013, showing percentage growth on base:

	2009	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	% Growth	% Of Total
SA Black	5068	5323	5744	6012	6199	6813	28.67%	25.23%
SA coloured	3623	3653	3687	3530	3573	3601	0.73%	13.34%
SA Indian	1630	1681	1671	1701	1714	1813	11.6%	6.72%
SA White	8984	9183	8992	8814	8434	8093	-10.69%	30%
International	3821	4171	4268	4802	4708	4674	19.57%	17.32%
Other	886	1003	1146	1191	1488	1993	73.28%	7.39%
Total	24012	25014	25508	26505	26116	26987	-0.32%	100%

Demographic of University Student Enrollments in 2021

Program	Asian	Black	Coloured	Indian	White	International (Rest of Africa)	Undeclared
Undergraduate	0.50%	32%	12%	5%	14%	7%	30%
Postgraduate	0.50%	25%	12%	5%	14%	18%	20%
PhD	0.50%	21%	9%	6%	20%	35%	8.9%

UCT had 36 different sports clubs in 2003, including team sports, individual sports, extreme sports and martial arts.

The university's sports teams, in particular the rugby union team, are known as the "Ikey Tigers" or the "Ikeys". The "Ikey" nickname originated in the 1910s as an antisemitic epithet applied to UCT students by the students of Stellenbosch University, because of the supposed large number of Jewish students at UCT. Stellenbosch is UCT's traditional rugby opponent; an annual "Intervarsity" match is played between the two universities. The University of Cape Town Football Club also known as the "Ikeys Warriors" is the main team for association football (soccer), representing the university at tournaments such as Varsity Football.

As of 2007 there were more than 80 student societies at UCT, falling into five categories:

• Academic societies for those interested in a particular field of study or studying a particular topic: The most prominent of these include the History and Current Affairs Society (HCA), the Space and Astronomy Society (SpaceSoc, also a SEDS South Africa chapter), the United Nations Association of South Africa (UNASA), and the Students for Law and Social Justice (SLSJ).
• Political societies, including branches of the youth wings of national political parties such as the South African Students Congress (SASCO), the Democratic Alliance Students Organisation (DASO), and the African National Congress Youth League.
• Religious societies, some of which are associated with religious denominations or local places of worship.
• National/cultural societies for students from particular countries or particular ethnic backgrounds.
• Special interest societies (such as RainbowUCT, the university's LGBTI society, UCT Mountain & Ski Club, UCT Ballroom and Latin dancing) for those interested in various activities or issues.

In addition to the plethora of student societies, there are several student organisations dedicated to the development of communities surrounding the university in the Cape Metropolitan Area. Some of the biggest include: SHAWCO, Ubunye and RAG. Recently, several students movements have developed, such as the Green Campus Initiative.

University rankings
Global – Overall
ARWU World	201-300 (2023)
CWUR World	267 (2023)
CWTS World	429 (2023)
QS World	=173 (2024)
THE World	167 (2024)
USNWR Global	=125 (2022-23)
Regional – Overall
QS BRICS	22 (2019)
THE Africa	1 (2023)
THE BRICS	10 (2020)
USNWR Africa	1 (2021)

The university received a rank of 198 in the 2019 QS World University Rankings, a rank of 156 in the 2019 Times Higher Education World University Rankings, and a rank of 201–300 in the Shanghai Academic Ranking of World Universities.

The faculty of Commerce as well as the faculty of Law and Medicine have appeared in the top 100 faculties internationally. The law faculty achieved a global rank of 40 in the 2014 QS World University Rankings by Subject. Although the university remains the highest ranking in Africa as of 2022 its ranking has been declining since 2015.

UCT Times Higher Education Ranking 2011 to 2024
Year	World Rank
2024	167
2023	160
2022	183
2021	155
2020	136
2019	136
2018	171
2017	148
2016	120
2015	124
2014	126
2013	126
2012	103
2011	107

Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. There is more info on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.

 QS World University Rankings  Times Higher Education World University Rankings

UCT is a member of the Worldwide Universities Network (WUN), the Association of African Universities, the Association of Commonwealth Universities, the Cape Higher Education Consortium, Higher Education South Africa, the International Alliance of Research Universities (IARU), the African Research Universities Alliance (ARUA) and the International Association of Universities.

The Faculty of Law is a member of the Law Schools Global League (LSGL).