South Africa
Lesotho
Namibia
Botswana
Mozambique
eSwatini
Zimbabwe
Tanzania
The old site did its job for the better part of a decade. It was also, by its own admission, showing its age. The new RunningCalendar is a clean-sheet rebuild: faster, mobile-native, dark-mode by default if that's your thing, and built to be just as easy for a search engine — or an AI assistant — to read as it is for a human. No more pinch-to-zoom. No more two different sites bolted together.
And it's still free. It always has been.
What's actually new
This isn't a coat of paint. The things runners asked for are now in the site:
Find races near you. A proper "Near Me" view that sorts upcoming events by how far they are from wherever you happen to be standing.
See it your way. Browse the calendar as a list, a month grid, or a live map with every event pinned and clustered — whichever matches how your brain works.
Search that finds things. Search by distance, province, terrain, city or country and actually get the race you were thinking of.
Your own runner profile. Claim a profile, keep your results in one place, and save the races you're eyeing so you stop losing them in 14 browser tabs.
"I've entered" and "Saved." Mark the ones you've committed to (deposit paid, no backing out now) separately from the maybes.
Follow what you care about. Follow a province, a distance, a terrain, or a specific event and get updates when something changes — with WhatsApp race alerts arriving soon for members.
Install it like an app. Add RunningCalendar to your home screen and it behaves like a native app, offline screen and all.
Now covering Southern Africa, not just South Africa
The biggest expansion isn't a feature — it's the map. RunningCalendar now lists events across South Africa, Namibia, Botswana, Lesotho, Mozambique, Eswatini, Zimbabwe and Tanzania. If you're chasing a Comrades or Two Oceans qualifier, planning a destination trail weekend, or just curious what's running over the border, it's all in one calendar now.
Independent, verified, free — and staying that way
RunningCalendar has never been owned by a timing company, an entry platform, or an events promoter, and that hasn't changed. Listings are checked, the calendar is open to every organiser, and the core site is free to use. For runners who'd rather not see ads, there's an optional ad-free membership for R29 a month — that's the whole business model, no asterisks.
"We've spent ten years being the calendar runners actually trust — independent, accurate, and free. The old site earned that trust but couldn't keep up with how people use their phones, or with how big the running scene south of the equator has become. This rebuild fixes both. It's the same promise — independent, verified, free — on a site that finally feels like 2026."
— Johan Havenga, founder, RunningCalendar.co.za
