This assessment is based on the national Red List assessment for South Africa (Wilson et al. 2016). Black-footed Cats are endemic to the arid regions of southern Africa, occurring widely across the western reaches in a relatively restricted and patchy distribution. The historical paucity of data has led to inconsistencies and perpetuated inaccuracies in current literature, which in turn has affected the accuracy of conservation measures. The naturally rare, cryptic colouring, small size and secretive nocturnal nature of this species has contributed considerably to the lack of information. Black-footed Cats are known to occur at low densities and it is difficult to establish population sizes. The stronghold of the species is suspected to be in the central Karoo region of South Africa where highest densities are reached, whereas other regions are suspected to have medium or low densities. Using density estimates of 0.03 km², 0.02 km² and 0.01 km² for high, medium and low density areas respectively, we converted kernel densities to isopleths to calculate population size. Estimated population size is 13,867 individuals, of which 9,707 are considered to be mature (using a 70% mature population structure), where no subpopulation is suspected to comprise more than 1,000 mature individuals as the species is patchily distributed. However, defining subpopulations for this species needs further work. We also caution that these estimates will be confounded by uneven sampling across the range, thus leading to inaccurate density isopleths. This is a first attempt and should be refined as more data from across the range become available.