University of Cape Town

Research performance overview

University of Cape Town is an education institution in South Africa represented in the ITS Research Intelligence database through OpenAlex and ROR-linked identity data. Over the most recent five-year window available locally, the institution is associated with 33,330 research works and 404,789 citations. Its current h-index is 707, while the five-year trend is broadly stable in recent publication activity. It currently places #273 in the ITS global research-performance ranking. Within South Africa, its current research-performance position is #1.

Five-year research output and impact

Recent citation volume is approximately 12.1 citations per five-year work when the two aggregate windows are divided. This is a descriptive ratio rather than a field-normalized citation indicator, because disciplines have very different citation practices. The h-index and i10-index add longer-run visibility context, while the growth metrics show direction of travel rather than historical accumulation alone.

Research trend by year

The yearly series runs from 2010 to 2026 in the current local snapshot. Annual research counts should be read as a pattern rather than as an audited financial-style total: scholarly metadata is continually corrected, affiliations can be re-resolved, and citations continue to accumulate after publication, so recent years always show fewer citations than older ones.

Research strengths and leading topics

The strongest topic signals currently associated with University of Cape Town include Geochemistry and Geologic Mapping, Geological Modeling and Analysis and Electrical and Electromagnetic Research. Topic lists are useful for understanding where an institution is visibly active, but they are not equivalent to a complete departmental census because OpenAlex topics are inferred from the institution’s works rather than from its administrative structure.

National benchmark

Among the 37 index-ready universities currently available for South Africa, the average five-year output is about 8,862 works and the average five-year citation count is about 78,386. University of Cape Town is currently above that research-output average and above the citation average. Its own growth signal is -3.0%, compared with a country-set average of 50.4%.

Deep research intelligence

Deep metrics extend the institution profile with compact work-level aggregates. International collaboration is the share of recent works with authors from more than one country. Open-access share comes from the five-year OpenAlex yearly series. The diversity signal summarizes the distribution of leading topic signals and should not be interpreted as an administrative measure of how many departments the institution operates.

Leading international research partner countries

How to interpret this university profile

ITS Research Solution treats this page as research intelligence rather than a prestige label. The score (ITS Research Score v3) summarizes measurable research activity over the five most recent complete calendar years: research output, citations, h-index and i10-index, citation impact per work, publication growth and international collaboration. Size still matters, so the score should be interpreted together with the trend table and topic profile. The citation impact trend compares citations per paper with the world average for papers of the same years, 2024-2025 vs 2021-2022; +10% means the newer papers are cited 10% more, relative to the world, than the older ones, and it is shown only when each period has at least 50 papers. A smaller institution with strong momentum can therefore look different from a large institution with a much longer publication history.

Rankings are recalculated from the local analytical database after OpenAlex synchronization. The public page is indexable only when the institution has enough recent research activity, at least five active years in the available trend window, and multiple topic signals. This quality gate prevents empty or minimally populated institution records from becoming search-engine pages.

Data sources and verification

The institution identity is linked to the Research Organization Registry (ROR) through the ROR identifier supplied by OpenAlex. Research counts, citation totals, yearly activity, h-index, i10-index and topic signals come from OpenAlex. OpenAlex institution records are themselves grounded in ROR for canonical institution identity. Data can change as scholarly records, affiliations and citation links are corrected, so the page records the latest local synchronization time rather than presenting the figures as permanent.

• OpenAlex institution ID: I157614274
• ROR ID: 03p74gp79
• Last synchronized: 2026-09-09 09:21:38

Frequently asked questions