What freelancers in South Africa can actually deduct

If you work for yourself, your deductible expenses are the ones actually incurred in producing your income, and not of a capital or private nature. Everything below follows from that test.

Two failure modes are common. Freelancers who claim nothing beyond obvious costs and overpay, and freelancers who claim generously and cannot support any of it when SARS asks. The difference is usually record-keeping rather than knowledge.

Home office

This is the most valuable deduction available to most freelancers and the most tightly policed. To claim it, the space must be:

Specifically equipped for your trade, and
Used regularly and exclusively for that purpose

Exclusively is the operative word. A dedicated room used only for work qualifies. A corner of the lounge does not, and neither does a spare room that also holds guests twice a year.

Where it qualifies, you apportion by floor area. If the office is 12m² of a 120m² home, you claim 10% of rent or bond interest, rates, electricity, and cleaning. Keep a floor plan with the measurements — it takes ten minutes and it is exactly what a verification asks for.

One caution on a home you own: claiming a portion of the property as business use affects the primary residence exclusion for capital gains tax when you eventually sell. For a small apportionment the annual deduction usually still wins, but it is worth doing the sum rather than assuming.

Travel

Business travel is deductible. Travel between your home and a fixed place of work is private, and this is where most claims go wrong.

You need a logbook. Not an estimate, not a reconstruction — a record of opening and closing odometer readings, and per trip the date, destination and business purpose. Without one, a travel claim will not survive verification, and SARS supplies a template for exactly this reason.

You may claim actual costs apportioned by business kilometres, or use the SARS deemed cost tables based on the vehicle's value. Work out both; which one wins depends on the vehicle and the mileage.

Equipment and the wear-and-tear allowance

A laptop is not deducted in full in the year you buy it unless it is a small item. It is a capital asset, written off over its useful life under the wear-and-tear allowance — commonly three years for computer equipment.

Where an item is used partly privately, apportion it. A phone used 70% for work is a 70% claim, and you should be able to say where that percentage came from.

The straightforward ones

Professional subscriptions and body membership fees
Software licences and cloud services
Accounting and legal fees relating to the trade
Bank charges on the business account
Advertising, website hosting and domain costs
Training that maintains or improves skills used in your existing trade
Insurance on business assets, and professional indemnity cover
Stationery and consumables

Training that qualifies you for a new trade is generally capital in nature and not deductible. Keeping current in the field you already work in is.

Retirement and medical

Retirement annuity contributions are deductible up to 27.5% of the greater of remuneration or taxable income, capped at R350 000 a year. For a freelancer with no employer fund, this is usually the single largest deduction available.

The medical scheme fees tax credit for 2026/27 is R376 a month for the main member and first dependant, and R254 for each additional dependant. It is a credit against tax, not a deduction, so it does not depend on your bracket.

What you cannot claim

Ordinary clothing, even if you bought it for client meetings. Only specialised protective or uniform clothing qualifies.
Entertainment, in most circumstances
Traffic fines and penalties
The full purchase price of capital equipment in year one
Any expense you cannot evidence

The record-keeping that makes it work

Keep records for five years. In practice that means a separate bank account for business income and expenses, digital copies of invoices and receipts filed monthly rather than annually, a logbook kept as you drive, and a note of the basis for every apportionment you have applied.

Remember too that freelance income makes you a provisional taxpayer. Two IRP6 returns a year, with the first due 31 August for a February year-end.

If you are unsure whether a specific cost qualifies, ask before you claim it rather than after.