BRANDS

MTN brand still leads the pack, latest Brand Finance study finds

By our African Marketing Confederation News Team | 2025

Telecoms brands feature strongly in the 2025 South African branding report. So do banking groups and retail chains.

Mobile communications company MTN retains its position as South Africa’s most valuable brand in the annual Brand Finance report, despite a decline in its brand value for the second consecutive year.

The decline is due to challenging business conditions, revenue losses and increased risks in Nigeria – which used to be its largest source of revenue – and weakened brand strength.

An MTN outlet at Bedford Centre, near Johannesburg. Photo: Bedford Centre

Despite these challenges, MTN’s high brand-strength scores in both South Africa and Nigeria indicate potential for future growth if conditions improve, Brand Finance says in its ‘Brand Finance South Africa 100 2025’ report released on Thursday, 6 March.

In second place for brand value is Vodacom, another cellular technology provider with pan-African business interests.

South Africa’s banking sector continues to be very strong brand-wise, and claims five of the top 10 positions. The banks are Standard Bank (third place), FNB (fourth), Absa (fifth), Nedbank (eighth) and Investec (ninth).

Grocery retailers also have a strong showing. Checkers is sixth, Woolworths is seventh and Shoprite is 10th. The brand values of both Checkers and Woolworths grew – by 23% and 17% respectively.

Brand value versus brand strength

Brand Finance defines brand value as the net economic benefit a brand owner would achieve by licensing the brand in the open market. A second metric, brand strength, is the efficacy of a brand’s performance on intangible measures relative to its competitors.

For brand strength, supermarket chain Checkers proved to be the strongest in 2025, driven by outstanding consumer perceptions and satisfaction with its pricing regime. Another retail group, Clicks, comes in second and grocery retailer Pick n Pay is third.

“Pick n Pay’s strong performance reflects improvements in ‘brand I know well’, ‘reputation’, and several other key brand metrics, though it ranks slightly lower in ‘brand I love’ and overall recommendation. Despite boardroom issues, these concerns have not hugely impacted consumer perceptions,” Brand Finance comments.

The country’s fastest-growing brand

The fastest-growing South African brand in 2025 is Capitec Bank, with an 81% increase in brand value. It moved from 23rd position in the Brand Finance ranking in 2024 to 14th position in 2025.

“This growth is driven by sustained strong financial performance, particularly in digital banking, where the number of banking app clients rose by 21% between August 2023 and August 2024. This increase reflects Capitec’s ability to innovate with digital, AI and enabling technologies to accommodate a growing tech-savvy audience amongst its consumer base,” Brand Finance states.

You can find out more about the ‘Brand Finance South Africa 100 2025’ report here.

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