[2] Childline runs a national, 24-hour, toll-free telephone counselling service for children and adults, handling over 1 million calls annually.

Calls to the Crisis Line are free from South African telephone networks Telkom, Vodacom and CellC, with the exception of MTN.

[4][10] Childline offered a free, online counselling service through the discontinued Mxit instant messaging application which was available to youth under the age of 21 years, as well as to adults with concerns about children.

[11][12] Initially trialled as a pilot project in 2009, the service quickly saw thousands of young people making use of it to seek help.

[28] The lack of a reliable source of recurring corporate and governmental donations has resulted in the threat of imminent closure of some Childline offices on several occasions.