The South African retail industry is a major industry with high public spending. As such, there is a high level of competition among retailers, pressuring marketers and retailers to gain and maintain a competitive advantage. By developing and adapting marketing strategies to target their market effectively, these marketers and retailers can differentiate themselves from their competitors. In order to develop and adapt their marketing strategies, they need to understand and focus on the motivations behind the act of shopping. Accordingly, this paper reports on a study undertaken to determine whether there are any gender differences amongst African Generation Y students’ hedonic and utilitarian shopping motivations in order to develop marketing strategies for effectively targeting the different gender segments in this market. In the South African context, individuals born between 1986 and 2005, labelled Generation Y, account for 37 percent of the total South African population, and the African Generation Y individuals represent 84 percent of the total Generation Y cohort. The primary data were collected by means of a self-administered questionnaire completed by a convenience sample of 404 African Generation Y students enrolled at two South African registered public higher education institutions (HEIs), situated in the Gauteng province was taken. The statistical analysis of the collected data included descriptive statistics and a two independent-samples t-test. The results indicate that male and female African Generation Y students appear to have statistically significant different hedonic and utilitarian shopping motivations. The findings of this study contributes to the practice of marketing by providing retailers and marketers with a better understanding of both male and female African Generation Y students by examining their hedonic and utilitarian shopping motivations, which will assist them in developing appropriate marketing strategies for effectively targeting this cohort