To alleviate any concerns about safety in Cape Town that you may have, I’ve put together a map that will show you which areas to avoid as a tourist. These areas have a higher rate of crime, and are the areas that make the international news as “Cape Town – Crime Capital”. They are the poorer areas with socio-economic problems. From a tourism perspective, they hold little interest, and there’s no real reason any visitor needs to go into these areas.

One thing I must note is that the drive from the airport to town is on the N2 highway and is surrounded by unsafe areas that I wouldn’t venture into. Just stay on the N2 until you get to the decent suburbs and you will be fine. You can easily see which areas are potentially unsafe and to be avoided. They have shacks, squatter camps and council tenements on each side of the N2. You really can’t mistake them for the better areas.

I’ve marked areas to avoid in blue on the map. This isn’t a hard and fast rule. In other words one can’t really draw a hard line on a map and say “OK, this side of the line is safe, and immediately on the other side is unsafe.”

Areas do blend gradually from safe to less safe, so bear that in mind.

What I have done is pretty much made sure that I err on the safe side with the blue areas. So as long as you stay outside the blue areas, you will be fine.

View Unsafe Areas in Cape Town in a larger map