List of sponges of South Africa

Sponges or sea sponges are primarily marine invertebrates of the metazoan phylum Porifera (/pəˈrɪfərəˌ pɔː-/ pər-IF-ər-ə, por-; meaning 'pore bearer'), a basal animal clade and a sister taxon of the diploblasts.

They are sessile filter feeders that are bound to the seabed, and are one of the most ancient members of macrobenthos, with many historical species being important reef-building organisms.

Sponges are multicellular organisms consisting of jelly-like mesohyl sandwiched between two thin layers of cells, and usually have tube-like bodies full of pores and channels that allow water to circulate through them.

Instead, most rely on maintaining a constant water flow through their bodies to obtain food and oxygen and to remove wastes, usually via flagella movements of the so-called "collar cells".

Believed to be some of the most basal animals alive today, sponges were possibly the first outgroup to branch off the evolutionary tree from the last common ancestor of all animals, with fossil evidence of primitive sponges such as Otavia from as early as the Tonian period (around 800 Mya).