The Department of Basic Education has released the results of the 2025 National Senior Certificate supplementary examinations, confirming that 67.4% of the candidates who wrote the second-sitting exams in February 2026 have achieved the minimum requirements to qualify for the National Senior Certificate.
The supplementary examination gives learners who narrowly failed the main sitting in November/December — specifically those who failed two or fewer subjects — an opportunity to improve or supplement their results without repeating an entire academic year. This year, more than 100,000 candidates registered for the supplementary examination, reflecting the scale of the opportunity it provides in the national schooling system.
Basic Education Minister Siviwe Gwarube described the results as encouraging but noted that the real measure of success lies in whether qualifying learners proceed to meaningful further education or employment. She announced that the department would be partnering with the National Youth Development Agency and the Department of Higher Education and Training to provide intensive career guidance and access-to-opportunity workshops for the learners now holding their certificates.
Subjects that showed the most significant improvement rates in the supplementary sitting include mathematics, mathematical literacy, life orientation and history, suggesting that the intensive support interventions offered through government and civil society bridging programmes in January had a measurable impact.
Across the country, the release of supplementary results has been greeted with a mix of relief and celebration by learners, parents and teachers — and tempered only by the knowledge that the matric certificate, while an important milestone, must be accompanied by further skills development in an economy where graduate unemployment remains stubbornly high.
