University · Johannesburg, South Africa

University of the Witwatersrand

Public research university in Johannesburg, South Africa

Official website and accounts

In EduFabTech articles

We have not written about University of the Witwatersrand yet.

Everything we know

From this institution's Wikidata record. Figures that change every year show the latest value; earlier years and longer lists open with a click.

About

instance of
inception
  • 1896
official name
  • University of the Witwatersrand
  • Universiteit van die Witwatersrand (nl)
  • Yunivesithi ya Witwatersrand (af)
motto text
  • Scientia et Labore (la)

Location and contact

country
located in the administrative territorial entity
headquarters location
  • Johannesburg · country: South Africa · postal code: 2000 · coordinate location: -26.1908, 28.0303 · street address: 1 Jan Smuts Avenue
coordinate location
  • -26.1908, 28.0303
official website

People and numbers

employees
  • 4,712

Rankings and recognition

ranking
  • 291 · QS World University Rankings · 2026
Earlier figures (13)
  • 267 · QS World University Rankings · 2025
  • 264 · QS World University Rankings · 2024
  • 428 · QS World University Rankings · 2023
  • 424 · QS World University Rankings · 2022
  • 403 · QS World University Rankings · 2021
  • 400 · QS World University Rankings · 2020
  • 381 · QS World University Rankings · 2019
  • 364 · QS World University Rankings · 2018
  • 359 · QS World University Rankings · 2017
  • 331 · QS World University Rankings · 2016
  • 318 · QS World University Rankings · 2015
  • 313 · QS World University Rankings · 2014
  • 363 · QS World University Rankings · 2012

Finances

funder
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $300,000 · award rationale: to support the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies’ research on critical minerals and industrial policy for a just transition in Africa · 2023
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $200,000 · award rationale: to support the Grantee's African Centre for the Study of the United States' research project on Africa's engagement with external actors · 2023
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $180,000 · award rationale: to support the Wits Centre for Journalism to advance knowledge of investigative reporting across a variety of thematic areas including the environment, health, gender, use of AI in media, as well as media security, safety and sustainability through multi-year support to the annual African Investigative Journalism Conference · 2023
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $387,947 · award rationale: to support the Centre for Applied Legal Studies. Funds to support this grant are drawn from AOSI’s Joint Fund to Promote and Advance Constitutionalism in South Africa (the "Constitutionalism Fund"), a collaboration among The Atlantic Philanthropies, the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations · 2022
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $147,756 · award rationale: to support the Citizen Justice Network. Funds to support this grant are drawn from AOSI’s Joint Fund to Promote and Advance Constitutionalism in South Africa (the "Constitutionalism Fund"), a collaboration among The Atlantic Philanthropies, the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations · 2022
14 more
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $34,000 · award rationale: to support the Southern Centre for Inequality Studies in its work to educate policy makers on the ways in which forms of shared ownership can contribute to economic recovery for economically marginalized communities · 2021
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $90,000 · award rationale: to support the Department of Journalism and Media Studies’ African Investigative Journalism conference in 2021/22 · 2021
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $140,000 · award rationale: to support the growth of the jamlab newsletter, online magazine and community of practice to support journalism and media innovation in South Africa and the continent · 2021
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $50,008 · award rationale: to support the growth of the jamlab newsletter, online magazine and community of practice to support journalism and media innovation in South Africa and the continent · 2021
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $49,133 · award rationale: to support the Department of Journalism and Media Studies’ African Investigative Journalism conference in 2020 · 2020
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $200,000 · award rationale: to support the Grantee’s work on the Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment program · 2020
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $1,000,000 · award rationale: to build capacity for vaccine development in Africa by generating and deepening African knowledge about the genome specificity of COVID-19 in Africa and the apparent high number of asymptomatic cases in Africa, and facilitating cross-border research into host-pathogen interactions influencing clinical outcomes in Africa · 2020
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $28,614 · award rationale: to support the knowledge sharing activities about journalism innovation in Africa at JamLab, a project of the Department of Journalism and Media Studies · 2019
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $422,181 · award rationale: Funds to support this grant are drawn from AOSI’s Joint Fund to Promote and Advance Constitutionalism in South Africa (the "Constitutionalism Fund"), a collaboration among The Atlantic Philanthropies, the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations. The Constitutionalism Fund has a mandate to support the efforts of civil society organizations to promote and advance constitutionalism in South Africa. In addition, emphasis is placed on internal institutional transformation such that key organizations in the field reflect the national demographic. This mandate also extends to the sustainability and transformation of the field more broadly. The grant is made consistent with this mandate and in support of the Grantee’s submitted and approved proposal and budget · 2019
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $158,318 · award rationale: Funds to support this grant are drawn from AOSI’s Joint Fund to Promote and Advance Constitutionalism in South Africa (the "Constitutionalism Fund"), a collaboration among The Atlantic Philanthropies, the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations. The Constitutionalism Fund has a mandate to support the efforts of civil society organizations to promote and advance constitutionalism in South Africa. In addition, emphasis is placed on internal institutional transformation such that key organizations in the field reflect the national demographic. This mandate also extends to the sustainability and transformation of the field more broadly. The grant is made consistent with this mandate and in support of the Grantee’s submitted and approved proposal and budget · 2019
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $80,567 · award rationale: to support the Department of Journalism and Media Studies’ African Investigative Journalism conference in 2019 · 2019
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $70,054 · award rationale: 2018 African Investigative Journalism Conference · 2018
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $123,074 · award rationale: 2017 Global Investigative Journalism Conference · 2017
  • Open Society Foundations · prize money: $211,351 · award rationale: to support the China-Africa Reporting Project · 2016

Structure and memberships

child organization or unit
has part(s)
member of
4 more
owner of

Other facts

geoshape
  • Data:South Africa/Gauteng/Wits University.map
Images and media on Wikimedia Commons (1)
image
Wikimedia and technical details (4)
Commons category
  • University of the Witwatersrand
topic's main category
category for alumni of educational institution
social media followers
  • 137,312 · X (Twitter) numeric user ID: 58521645 · 7 February 2023
Earlier figures (3)
  • 127,801 · X (Twitter) numeric user ID: 58521645 · 7 January 2022
  • 119,931 · X (Twitter) numeric user ID: 58521645 · 6 January 2021
  • 111,628 · X (Twitter) numeric user ID: 58521645 · 24 April 2020
Identifiers in other databases (46)
ARCHON code
  • 925 · subject named as: Historical Papers, William Cullen Library, University of the Witwatersrand
ARWU university ID
Bibliothèque nationale de France ID
BIBSYS ID
Canadiana Name Authority ID
Crunchbase organization ID
Dialnet author ID
Encyclopædia Britannica Online ID
FES digital collections entity ID
Freebase ID
GND ID
Google Maps Customer ID
Google Scholar organization ID
GRID ID
Harvard Index of Botanists ID
IdRef ID
ISNI
J9U entity ID
Kalliope-Verbund (GND) ID
KISTI ID
Libraries Australia ID
Library of Congress Authorities ID
Microsoft Academic ID (discontinued)
MusicBrainz place ID
National Library of Poland MMS ID
National Library of Wales Authority ID
NL CR AUT ID
  • ko2007416564 · subject named as: University of the Witwatersrand
NLA Trove people ID
Open Funder Registry funder ID
  • 501100001336 · subject named as: University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg · reason for preferred rank: currently valid value
  • 100009467
OpenAlex ID
QS World University ID
Quora topic ID
RERO ID (legacy)
Ringgold ID
  • 37707 · subject named as: University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg
ROR ID
SNARC ID
Times Higher Education World University ID
U-Multirank university ID
UK Parliament thesaurus ID
  • 86268 · subject named as: University of the Witwatersrand Johannesburg
Union List of Artist Names ID
UniRank ID
VIAF cluster ID
Wellcome Collection concept ID
X (Twitter) username
  • witsuniversity · has characteristic: verified account or profile · number of subscribers: 111,628 · X (Twitter) numeric user ID: 58521645 · 24 April 2020
  • WitsUniversity · X (Twitter) numeric user ID: 58521645 · 6 October 2025
‎Scilit organization ID
‎Yale LUX ID

Campuses and colleges