About AskSmarty
AskSmarty is a free, independent guide to applying to universities and colleges in South Africa. We help you find a programme, check if you qualify with a free APS calculator, see deadlines, and apply on the correct official portal. We do not process applications and we never take payment. Our one promise: tell you the truth about what you need, then send you to the official source to act on it. Anything? AskSmarty.
What we do
We bring the information layer that official portals leave out: entry requirements, admission scores, application fees, closing dates, and how to apply - across 36 institutions and 2,120 programmes, plus the 50 public TVET colleges and the DHET register of private colleges. Every programme and college links out to the official portal to complete the application.
Who runs AskSmarty
AskSmarty is built and maintained by the AskSmarty editorial team - a small group of South African education-data researchers who compile admissions data and check it against official institution and government sources before it is published. We are not a recruitment agent, an institution, or a government body, and we earn nothing from where you choose to apply. The site is editorially independent: no institution pays to appear, to rank higher, or to change what we publish about it. Every programme, requirement and date is reviewed against its official source, and when we are unsure of a fact we say so on the page rather than guess.
Where our data comes from
Programme data is built from official institution prospectuses and public application sources. TVET and private-college data is drawn from the Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) registers and official college sites. We restructure these into a single catalogue, tag each record with the cycle and source it came from, and show the date the page was last built. Where a record is from an earlier cycle, the page says so. We never invent an APS, a closing date, or a requirement - if we do not have a field, we leave it blank and point you to the official source.
How we keep it current
Open, closing-soon and closed statuses are recomputed from each programme’s deadline every time the site rebuilds, so a date that has passed flips to closed automatically. The “Updated” date you see on every page is the real build date (12 Jun 2026). Application cycles change every year - dates, fees and requirements age fast - so we always tell you to confirm the detail on the official site before you rely on it.
Found an error? Tell us
Data ages and institutions change their requirements. If a fact on AskSmarty looks wrong or out of date, please report it on our contact page with the page and what you saw. We check reported errors against the official source and correct them, because a wrong APS or deadline is worse than none.
Independence
AskSmarty is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by any university, college, the Central Applications Office (CAO), the DHET, or NSFAS. All apply and status-check actions link out to the official portals. We are reader-supported and may show advertising, clearly labelled and never disguised as content. Advertising never influences what we publish or how programmes are ranked.
Stay safe
No legitimate body asks for payment to “release” an offer or guarantee a space. Apply only on official portals, never pay registration or fees into a personal bank account, and never share your application login. If something feels rushed or too good to be true, stop and verify with the institution first.