The dreaded “system is offline” message at Home Affairs could become far less common as the department reports a major drop in downtime across South Africa.
Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber says system upgrades and modernisation have more than halved the number of hours lost to technical disruptions since 2024.
During the 2024/25 financial year, Home Affairs recorded 35,261 hours of system downtime. That dropped by 62% to 13,497 hours in 2025/26.
‘System offline’ problem takes a hit
Downtime linked specifically to the National Population Register (NPR) also declined.
Hours lost to NPR disruptions fell from 14,720 in 2024/25 to 11,479 in 2025/26, representing a 22% reduction.
Schreiber cautioned that these numbers do not represent complete service hours lost. The department records downtime across individual systems, meaning two systems failing at the same time can each contribute to the total.
Partial interruptions are also counted even when some Home Affairs services remain available.
Despite this, the department says the figures provide an indication of how technical disruptions are affecting offices.
Home Affairs upgrades systems
A major technology overhaul is behind the push for more reliable services.
The department has migrated 226 network links to fibre and 12 to LTE, while the remaining 69 Diginet links are being replaced. Offices are also being upgraded to 50 Mbps connections, with dual links being introduced.
A total of 182 offices have moved from a legacy desktop system to Service Manager Web, while 48 core application servers have been replaced.
Home Affairs has also been pursuing a broader digital transformation programme aimed at moving more services online and reducing reliance on traditional office-based processes.
Downtime has not disappeared
The improvements do not mean Home Affairs has eliminated technical failures.
While overall system downtime declined across all nine provinces, NPR-related downtime increased in KwaZulu-Natal, North West and the Northern Cape.
The department is now implementing end-to-end monitoring that will track networks, infrastructure, applications and services. Schreiber said this should allow Home Affairs to more accurately identify how long disruptions last, which offices are affected and what caused them.
For South Africans accustomed to hearing “the system is offline”, the numbers suggest that excuse may at least be becoming harder to use.
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