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Mexico lies in the south of North America, between the Pacific Ocean on one side and the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea on the other. Two long mountain ranges, the Sierra Madre Occidental and the Sierra Madre Oriental, frame a high central plateau. Mexico City, the capital, sits in a high valley at about 2,240 m, surrounded by volcanoes.
Long before Europeans arrived, the land was home to great civilisations: the Olmecs, the Maya, the builders of Teotihuacan, the Zapotecs and the Aztecs, who built their capital Tenochtitlan on an island in a lake. Spain conquered the Aztec capital in 1521 and ruled New Spain for three centuries. Mexico won its independence in 1821.
Today Mexico is a federal republic of about 134 million people, the largest Spanish-speaking population in the world. It is famous for its food, its music, its festivals such as the Day of the Dead, and a warm, family-centred way of life. Its culture is a blend of Indigenous and Spanish roots that you can see, hear and taste everywhere.
Mexico's story begins thousands of years before the Spanish arrived, with cities, pyramids and calendars built by the Olmecs, Maya, Zapotecs and Aztecs. After three centuries as the Spanish colony of New Spain, Mexico fought for independence, lost about half of its territory to the United States, survived a French invasion and a long revolution, and became the modern republic it is today.
By about 1200 BC the Olmecs, often called the 'mother culture' of Mesoamerica, were building ceremonial centres such as San Lorenzo in today's Veracruz. They are famous for giant stone heads, the largest about 3.4 m tall.
In July 615, a boy of twelve called K'inich Janaab' Pakal became ruler of the Maya city of Palenque, in today's Chiapas. He reigned for 68 years, and his richly decorated tomb was found inside the Temple of the Inscriptions in 1952.
According to tradition, the Mexica (Aztecs) founded their capital Tenochtitlan in 1325 on an island in Lake Texcoco, where they saw an eagle perched on a cactus. The city grew into one of the largest in the world, and Mexico City now stands on its ruins.
In April 1519 the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés landed on the Gulf Coast and founded the town of Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz. In November he entered Tenochtitlan and met the Aztec emperor Moctezuma II.
After a long siege, helped by thousands of Indigenous allies, above all the Tlaxcalans, Cortés captured Tenochtitlan on 13 August 1521. Spain built Mexico City on the ruins and ruled the colony of New Spain for three centuries.
On 16 September 1810, the priest Miguel Hidalgo rang his church bell in the town of Dolores and called on the people to rise up against Spanish rule. Mexicans celebrate Independence Day on 16 September, and the president repeats the cry every year on the night before.
After eleven years of war, the Treaty of Córdoba was signed in August 1821, and on 27 September the Army of the Three Guarantees marched into Mexico City, ending Spanish rule.
The Mexican-American War ended with this treaty in February 1848. Mexico gave up what is now California, Nevada, Utah and most of Arizona, along with parts of other US states. Counting Texas, which had broken away earlier, Mexico lost about half of the land it had claimed.
On 5 May 1862 a smaller Mexican army defeated invading French troops outside the city of Puebla. The victory is remembered as Cinco de Mayo, which is celebrated more widely in the United States than in most of Mexico.
France had installed the Austrian archduke Maximilian as Emperor of Mexico in 1864. When the French withdrew, the forces of President Benito Juárez captured him, and he was executed at Querétaro on 19 June 1867.
On 20 November 1910 Francisco Madero called for an uprising against the long rule of Porfirio Díaz. A decade of fighting followed, with leaders such as Emiliano Zapata and Pancho Villa, and around one million people died.
The constitution approved in Querétaro on 5 February 1917 laid the foundations for land reform, workers' rights and free, secular education. With many changes, it is still in force today.
On 18 March 1938, President Lázaro Cárdenas nationalised the oil owned by foreign companies and created the state company Pemex. The day is still remembered with pride.
In October 1968 Mexico City held the first Olympic Games ever staged in Latin America and in a Spanish-speaking country. Just days before, soldiers had killed protesting students at Tlatelolco, a tragedy Mexicans still remember.
In July 2000 Vicente Fox of the National Action Party won the presidency, the first time in 71 years that the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI) lost a presidential election.
On 1 October 2024 Claudia Sheinbaum, a scientist and former head of government of Mexico City, was sworn in as the first woman president of Mexico.
Mexican food is built on corn, beans and chillies, which were grown here thousands of years ago. Corn is soaked and cooked with lime (calcium hydroxide, not the fruit) to make masa, the dough for tortillas and tamales. Breakfast is often hearty, and the main meal of the day, la comida, is eaten in the early afternoon: it may start with a soup, then rice or pasta (called 'sopa seca', dry soup), then a main dish with tortillas, and finally a dessert. Supper in the evening is usually light. In 2010 UNESCO added traditional Mexican cuisine to its list of the world's intangible cultural heritage.
Thin slices of marinated pork, cooked on a vertical spit called a trompo, shaved into small corn tortillas and topped with onion, coriander (cilantro), salsa and often a sliver of pineapple.
The spit-roasting method came to Mexico with Lebanese immigrants, who cooked lamb shawarma. Their Lebanese-Mexican descendants switched to pork, a chilli marinade and corn tortillas, which gave us the taco al pastor.
A dark, rich sauce made from several kinds of dried chillies, spices, nuts, seeds, bread and a little chocolate, served over turkey or chicken. It can take a whole day to make and is served at weddings and big family celebrations.
A popular legend says the nuns of the Convent of Santa Clara in Puebla invented it for a visiting archbishop, using whatever they had in the kitchen.
Large green poblano chillies stuffed with minced meat and fruit, covered with a creamy white walnut sauce and sprinkled with red pomegranate seeds. It is served at room temperature.
Green, white and red are the colours of the Mexican flag, and the dish is eaten in August and September, when pomegranates are in season and Mexico celebrates its independence.
Pork marinated in bitter orange juice and achiote (annatto), which turns it a deep orange, then wrapped in banana leaves and slow-roasted, traditionally in a pit in the ground. It is served with tortillas and pink pickled onions.
Pibil comes from the Maya word for the earth oven in which the meat is buried to cook.
A hearty soup of large, chewy hominy corn kernels cooked with pork or chicken. It comes white, green or red, and everyone adds their own toppings: shredded cabbage or lettuce, radish, onion, oregano, chilli and lime.
Pozole has been eaten since before the Spanish arrived, and many families serve it on Independence Day and New Year's Eve.
Parcels of corn dough (masa) with a filling such as chicken in green salsa, pork in red salsa, cheese with chilli, or something sweet, wrapped in a corn husk or banana leaf and steamed. You unwrap them and eat only the inside.
Tamales were eaten in Mesoamerica thousands of years before the Spanish arrived. Families often make hundreds of them together for Christmas.
A very large, thin, crisp tortilla spread with refried beans and pork lard, then topped with cabbage, avocado, stringy Oaxaca cheese and grilled meat. It is grilled over charcoal, sometimes folded in half.
Corn tortillas dipped in chilli sauce, rolled around a filling such as chicken or cheese, and topped with more sauce, cream, crumbly cheese and onion. The name means 'seasoned with chilli'.
Fried tortilla pieces simmered briefly in green or red salsa, then topped with cream, crumbly cheese, onion and often shredded chicken or a fried egg. It is a clever way to use up yesterday's tortillas.
Ripe avocado mashed with lime juice, onion, chilli, coriander (cilantro) and salt, traditionally in a stone bowl called a molcajete. It is eaten with tortilla chips or served with tacos.
The name comes from the Nahuatl word āhuacamōlli, which means 'avocado sauce'.
A fresh, uncooked salsa of chopped tomato, white onion, green chilli, coriander (cilantro), lime juice and salt, served with tacos, eggs and grilled meat.
The name means 'rooster's beak'. Because it is red, white and green, it is also called salsa bandera, 'flag sauce'.
Corn kernels boiled with salt and the herb epazote, served in a cup with lime juice, mayonnaise, crumbly cheese and chilli powder. Street vendors sell them in the evening, next to elotes, whole corn cobs on a stick.
The name comes from the Nahuatl word ízquitl, meaning 'toasted corn'.
A soft, sweet round bun, often flavoured with orange blossom or anise, decorated with strips of dough shaped like bones and dusted with sugar. It is baked in the weeks before the Day of the Dead, on 1 and 2 November.
Families place pan de muerto on home altars called ofrendas as a gift for their loved ones who have died, and then share it themselves.
A thick, sweet caramel sauce made by slowly cooking goat's milk with sugar. It is spread on crêpes, poured over ice cream or eaten from a spoon, and cajeta from Celaya is the most famous.
A cool, deep-red drink made by steeping dried hibiscus flowers in water and sweetening it. It is one of the most popular aguas frescas, the fresh drinks served in big glass jars at markets and taco stands.
The hibiscus flower came to the Americas from Africa, but agua de jamaica is now one of Mexico's favourite drinks.
A spirit distilled from the heart of the blue agave plant. By law it must be made from blue agave in a protected area centred on Jalisco. Its smoky cousin, mezcal, can be made from many kinds of agave and comes mostly from Oaxaca.
In 1974 tequila became Mexico's first protected appellation of origin, so only spirit made in the approved area may use the name.
Mexico's cities range from one of the world's biggest capitals to small colonial towns of painted houses and cobbled lanes, from busy border cities in the north to Maya towns and Caribbean resorts in the south.
The capital, built on the ruins of the Aztec city of Tenochtitlan in a high valley at 2,240 m. Its metropolitan area has more than 21 million people, and it is packed with museums, markets, parks and grand old buildings.
One of Mexico's largest cities and the capital of Jalisco, the home state of mariachi music and tequila, with a handsome old centre of plazas and churches.
A big, modern business and industrial city in the northeast, at the foot of the Sierra Madre Oriental mountains.
A lively border city right next to San Diego in California. Millions of people cross between the two countries here every year.
A colonial city founded by the Spanish in 1531, about 100 km southeast of Mexico City, with churches covered in painted tiles and a historic centre listed by UNESCO.
A colourful colonial city in the southern mountains, at the heart of a region with strong Zapotec and Mixtec traditions. Its official name is Oaxaca de Juárez.
The capital of Yucatán state and the cultural centre of the Yucatán Peninsula, where Maya and Spanish traditions mix. It has one of the largest historic centres in the Americas.
A small, pastel-painted colonial town about 40 km east of Chichén Itzá, and a quieter base for visiting the ruins than the big resorts.
A resort city on the Caribbean coast, planned by the government from 1970, when the island had only three residents. In 2023 it welcomed a record 21 million visitors.
A former silver-mining city of brightly painted houses squeezed into a narrow valley. Some of its main streets run through underground tunnels that once carried a river.
A charming colonial town in the highlands, loved by artists and by many foreign retirees. It is named after a friar, Juan de San Miguel, and the independence hero Ignacio Allende, who was born here.
Mexico's oldest and most important port on the Gulf of Mexico, founded by Hernán Cortés in 1519. It is known for its lively squares, where people listen to music late into the night, and its sidewalk cafés.
A great Maya city on the Yucatán Peninsula, about 40 km west of Valladolid, voted one of the New Seven Wonders of the World in 2007. Around the spring and autumn equinoxes, late-afternoon shadows form a wavy 'serpent' down the northern stairway of its stepped pyramid, El Castillo (the Temple of Kukulcán).
UNESCO World Heritage
The ruins of a huge ancient city about 40 km northeast of Mexico City, which may have had around 100,000 people at its height. You can walk along the Avenue of the Dead between the Pyramid of the Sun and the Pyramid of the Moon. It was built centuries before the Aztecs, who later gave it its name.
UNESCO World Heritage
Mexico's great cathedral stands on the north side of the Zócalo, Mexico City's vast main square, next to the ruins of the Aztec Templo Mayor. It was built in stages from 1573 to 1813 and is part of UNESCO's Historic Centre of Mexico City and Xochimilco.
UNESCO World Heritage
Mexico's largest and most visited museum, in Chapultepec Park. Its treasures include the great Aztec Sun Stone, often called the Aztec calendar, and a replica of the carved lid of Pakal's tomb from Palenque. It is closed on Mondays.
The cobalt-blue house in Coyoacán where the painter Frida Kahlo was born, lived with Diego Rivera for some years, and died. It opened as a museum in 1958, with her paintings, clothes and studio. It is closed on Mondays.
The ancient capital of the Zapotecs, founded around 500 BC on a flattened mountain top about 9 km from Oaxaca city. Its great plaza, temples and ball court look out over three valleys.
UNESCO World Heritage
In the town of Cholula, just outside Puebla, it is the largest pyramid in the world by volume, but it is so overgrown that it looks like a natural hill. A Catholic church, Our Lady of Remedies, stands on top, and visitors can walk through tunnels inside.
The pink parish church on the main square of San Miguel de Allende. Its fairy-tale Gothic-style front was added from 1880 by a local builder, Zeferino Gutiérrez. The town is a World Heritage Site together with the nearby Sanctuary of Atotonilco.
UNESCO World Heritage
A huge neoclassical orphanage and hospital founded in 1810 by the bishop of Guadalajara, now a museum. Its chapel is covered with powerful murals painted by José Clemente Orozco in the late 1930s.
UNESCO World HeritageAs of 2026, Mexico has the largest Spanish-speaking population in the world: almost all of its about 134 million people speak Spanish.
Corn (maize) was first domesticated by Indigenous peoples in southern Mexico about 9,000 years ago, from a wild grass called teosinte.
Mexico City is sinking. It stands on the soft clay of an old lake bed, and because so much water is pumped from underground, some areas have sunk as much as 9 m since the early 1900s.
The asteroid that wiped out the dinosaurs about 66 million years ago struck near today's Yucatán Peninsula. Its buried crater, Chicxulub, is about 200 km across.
The Great Pyramid of Cholula, near Puebla, is the largest pyramid in the world by volume, larger than the Great Pyramid of Giza, although it is much lower.
The Caesar salad is generally credited to Caesar Cardini, an Italian-born restaurateur, who is said to have created it at his restaurant in Tijuana in 1924, not in Italy or the United States.
The Chihuahua, the smallest recognised dog breed, is a Mexican breed. It shares its name with Chihuahua, the largest Mexican state by area.
Every winter, millions of migrating monarch butterflies gather in the high fir forests on the border of Michoacán and the State of Mexico, about 100 km northwest of Mexico City. Their reserve became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2008.
The Mexican flag shows an eagle on a cactus eating a snake. It recalls the Aztec legend of the sign that told them where to build Tenochtitlan.
In 2008 UNESCO added the Day of the Dead to its list of the world's intangible cultural heritage. Families build altars with marigolds, photos and the favourite foods of their loved ones who have died.
Every station of the Mexico City Metro has its own small picture symbol, designed by Lance Wyman, who also designed the graphics for the 1968 Olympics.
As of 2026, Mexico has 36 UNESCO World Heritage Sites, more than any other country in the Americas.
Chocolate (cacao), vanilla, tomatoes, avocados and chillies were all grown and eaten in Mexico long before Europeans had heard of them. The word avocado comes from āhuacatl, its name in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs.
Pronunciation is written the way it sounds; the capital letters show where the stress goes. Audio is coming soon.
Do not drink tap water. Use bottled or boiled water, and be careful with ice in drinks. Many hotels and restaurants use purified water and ice, so ask if you are unsure.
Mexico City is about 2,240 m above sea level. On your first day or two, walk slowly, drink plenty of water and go easy on alcohol, especially if you have heart or breathing problems.
Mexican prices are written with the same sign as the US dollar, but they are in Mexican pesos. Carry some cash for markets, street food and small shops, and use cash machines inside banks or shopping centres in daylight.
In restaurants a tip (propina) of about 10 to 15 percent is normal for good service. Check the bill first in case it has already been added. The person packing your bags at the supermarket also expects a few coins.
At airports, use only authorised, prepaid taxis, bought at the official desk. In town, take taxis from an official rank (sitio) or ask your hotel to call one. Ride apps work in big cities, but in some resort areas, such as Cancún, taxi drivers have protested against them.
Big museums such as the National Museum of Anthropology and the Frida Kahlo Museum are closed on Mondays. Plan museum days for Tuesday to Sunday, and buy Frida Kahlo tickets online in advance if you can.
Hurricane season runs from June to November and can affect both the Pacific and the Caribbean coasts. If you travel then, keep an eye on the weather forecasts and follow local advice.
Dengue, Zika and chikungunya are spread by mosquitoes in parts of Mexico, especially in hot, low-lying areas. Use insect repellent and cover up in the early morning and evening.
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