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The 2025 City Profiling Report for Cape Town describes a city with strong institutional governance and high service delivery standards relative to other SADC cities, yet one plagued by deep structural inequality and chronic traffic congestion. While the city maintains a clean audit record and high human development indices, it faces significant challenges in youth unemployment, informal settlement growth, and climate vulnerability, particularly regarding water scarcity and fire risk.

Dar es Salaam is one of Africa's fastest-growing cities and Tanzania's economic hub, though it faces significant challenges in infrastructure and governance. While the city's GDP is growing and it leads the country in startups and telecommunications, it is characterized by high levels of informality, with 70% of the population living in informal settlements. Public services such as water, sanitation, and waste management are underperforming, and the city is highly vulnerable to flooding and urban heat. Governance is heavily centralized, with local authorities relying on the national government for approximately 75% to 90% of their revenue, severely limiting their fiscal autonomy and ability to address local needs.

The Lilongwe City Profiling Report 2025 provides a comprehensive analysis of the capital city of Malawi, detailing its urban geography, governance, socio-economic status, and service delivery. The report highlights a city facing significant challenges including high poverty levels, limited infrastructure, and a governance structure where the local council has minimal de facto control over essential services like health and education, which remain managed by the central government.

The report compares 10 SADC cities, revealing stark disparities in economic wealth and infrastructure. While South African cities like Johannesburg and Cape Town are the wealthiest, they face high inequality and unemployment. Most other cities are characterized by high proportions of informal housing (60-86%) and a heavy reliance on national parastatals for engineered services. Sanitation remains the most critical service gap, with sewered sanitation being rare outside of South Africa and Zimbabwe. Local government finance varies wildly, with some cities relying heavily on national transfers while others, particularly in Zimbabwe, receive no transfers despite high service obligations.

The Harare City Profiling Report 2025 details the challenges facing Zimbabwe's capital, characterized by rapid informal urban growth, severe infrastructure decay, and a strained relationship between the opposition-led city council and the national government. While Harare serves as the country's economic hub, it suffers from critical gaps in water, sanitation, and waste management, with a significant portion of the population living in informal settlements. The report highlights a severe fiscal crisis where the city relies almost entirely on its own limited revenue sources while facing low payment compliance and high levels of non-revenue water.

The report provides a comprehensive profile of Luanda, highlighting its rapid population growth, extreme economic inequality, and a highly centralised governance structure. While the city has benefited from oil wealth, significant service delivery gaps persist, particularly in housing, water, and sanitation for those in informal settlements. The report notes that Luanda is one of the most congested cities globally and faces increasing climate risks, including flooding and sea-level rise.

The Maputo metropolitan area, with a population of 2.9 million, serves as Mozambique's primary economic and political hub but faces significant challenges in service delivery and infrastructure. While the city shows economic growth and improving health indices, it is characterized by high levels of informal settlements, inadequate sanitation, and a fragmented local government system with limited functional autonomy. Key infrastructure projects like the Maputo-Katembe bridge have improved connectivity, but the region remains one of the poorest primary cities in the SADC region, with a heavy reliance on charcoal for cooking and a high prevalence of waterborne diseases among children.