Scientists have discovered dinosaur footprints along South Africa’s coastline, offering new evidence that dinosaurs continued to live in southern Africa long after massive volcanic eruptions reshaped the region around 182 million years ago.
Southern Africa is known for its rich fossil history, particularly in the Karoo Basin. However, after widespread lava flows covered much of the basin, the fossil record becomes noticeably quiet during the Jurassic Period. The new discovery is helping to fill this long-standing gap.
In 2025, researchers first reported dinosaur tracks dating to around 140 million years ago on a remote stretch of coastline in the Western Cape. Follow-up work has now uncovered more than two dozen additional footprints at a small site near Knysna.
The tracks, found in the Brenton Formation, are estimated to be about 132 million years old. This makes them the youngest known dinosaur tracks in southern Africa and among the very few from the Cretaceous Period in the country.
Despite the small size of the site, the number of footprints suggests dinosaurs were relatively common in the area at the time. Today, the location lies in an intertidal zone and is covered by seawater twice a day, but millions of years ago it likely consisted of river channels or coastal plains.
The footprints appear to have been made by a mix of dinosaurs, including meat-eating theropods and plant-eating species such as ornithopods and possibly large sauropods. However, researchers say it is difficult to identify exact species based on tracks alone.
Southern Africa holds an extensive record of prehistoric life from the Mesozoic Era, but later volcanic activity, including the formation of the Drakensberg Group, covered many fossil-rich layers.
The discovery of tracks in both the Robberg Formation and the Brenton Formation suggests more fossil sites may still be waiting to be found. Scientists believe further exploration could uncover additional tracks, bones, and other traces of ancient life.
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