15 Extraordinary Museums to Visit on Your Next Trip to Mexico City
There are 162 museums in Mexico City alone, and the whole country has over 1,400!
Mexico is widely known for having successfully safeguarded its unique culture, history, and traditions. You can actually find that the first museum in Mexico City, the Museum of Natural History (El museo de historia natural), is as old as 200 years.
In this post, you will find 15 of the most spectacular museums in Mexico City showcasing art, history, geology, and even cartoons! I’m sure you won’t want to miss any of them on your next trip to the Mexican capital.
PRO TIP! Mexicans abbreviate Mexico City as CDMX, which comes from Ciudad (CD) de México (MX).
1. Palacio de Bellas Artes
- Location: Juárez avenue S/N, Centro Histórico de la Ciudad de México, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, 06050, Mexico City
- Main feature: Its size and neoclassical architecture
El Palacio de Bellas Artes is one of the most outstanding buildings and top museums in Mexico City. You don’t have to go inside to appreciate art in its purest form, it lies right outside over its architecture. For 3.77 USD (75 Mexican pesos), from Tuesday to Sunday you can go inside and appreciate 17 murals in permanent expositions, a wide array of art expositions and stained glass that belongs to the Mexican folk ballet. Opening hours are from 11 am to 5 pm.
Mexicans built this beautiful building in 1904, but finished it 30 years later. If you’re in Mexico City, this museum is a must!
2. Chapultepec Castle
- Location: Bosque de Chapultepec I Secc, Miguel Hidalgo, 11100 Mexico City
- Main feature: Its beautiful architecture and vast extension
Chapultepec Castle (El Castillo de Chapultepec) is one of the most impressive views and best art museums in Mexico City. It welcomes you with an astonishing mural of a kid who fell off Chapultepec and neoclassical and neo-gothic architecture. As you venture inside the castle you can find many rooms of how people lived at the time, and belonged to the Mexican viceroy—Mexicans built it between 1778 and 1788.
Inside you can stroll throughout blooming gardens and find many art expositions, alongside Diego Rivera’s murals. The entrance fee is 4 USD (80 Mexican pesos).
3. National Art Museum (MUNAL)
- Location: Tacuba street 8, Centro Histórico de la Ciudad de México, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, 06000 Mexico City
- Main feature: The varying expositions
In the National Art Museum (Museo Nacional de Arte – MUNAL) you can find Mexican and international art ranging from the 16th to the 20th century. Its area of 59,200 sq feet (5,500 sq m) offers you around 3,000 expositions. The entrance fee is 3.52 USD (70 Mexican Pesos).
The best thing about this museum is that you can visit it more than once on different visits, since they change their expositions frequently, so you probably won’t see the same exposition the second or third time you decide to visit this amazing museum in Mexico City.
4. Frida Kahlo Museum, Blue House
- Location: Londres 247, Del Carmen, Coyoacán, 04100 Mexico City
- Main feature: Being Frida Kahlo’s house
Have you ever heard of Frida Kahlo? She is one of the most recognized female Mexican painters in the world (among other things). You can visit the place that witnessed this Mexican artistic titan’s life.
For 12.37 USD (246 Mexican pesos) you can enter Kahlo’s realms and unravel her art, dresses, thoughts, letters, and more while exploring. You’ll be able to see Kahlo’s canvases, what used to be her bed, her room, her bathroom, and many personal things. As it is a museum that revolves around one person’s life, you might find a deeper connection with Frida Kahlo while visiting this museum.
It is a good idea to buy the tickets online in order to get a place since the museum tends to be crowded.
5. Kids’ Museum
- Location: Constituyentes avenue 268, Bosque de Chapultepec II Secc, Miguel Hidalgo, 11840 Mexico City
- Main feature: Being an interactive museum, perfect for kids, but also great for adults
This is a nice and different museum in Mexico City. The kids’ museum (Papalote – Museo del Niño) has many different things which revolve around kids, and it’s one of the few interactive museums in Mexico City.
The museum connects every topic that it covers. You start with microorganisms, going throughout the anatomy of the body, connecting this with the environment and cities. It offers awesome and strange things such as nail beds and giant bubbles. The entrance fee is 10 USD (199 Mexican pesos) but you can find quite a lot of sales going on their webpage. It’s definitely an amazing and fun museum to visit in Mexico City.
6. Soumaya Museum
- Location: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra boulevard, Granada, Miguel Hidalgo, 11529 Mexico City
- Main feature: Its outer peculiar architecture
16,000 aluminum hexagons make up the outer part of this museum, giving it one of the most distinctive looks among the museums in Mexico City. Soumaya museum (El Museo Soumaya) offers six different exposition rooms in which you can find many different types of art. You can find European pieces such as Renoir’s, El Greco’s, Picasso’s, and Dalí’s as well as Mexican art spread throughout 6,200 pieces.
If you fancy some reading, Soumaya museum won’t let you down, because you can find a library within with more than 3,000 books to check out.
The best part of this museum is that this is one of the free museums in Mexico City!
7. National Museum of Anthropology
- Location: Paseo de la Reforma s/n avenue, Polanco, Bosque de Chapultepec I Secc, Miguel Hidalgo, 11560 Mexico City
- Main feature: Hosting antique pieces belonging to the three cultures that inhabited Mexico before the Spanish conquest
The National Museum of Anthropology (El Museo Nacional de Antropología – MNA) is the dream of any anthropology student. But you don’t need to be an anthropology student to be able to learn about everything you can find in this museum.
Here you can find amazing pieces of the cultures that inhabited Mexico before the Spanish colonization such as the Maya, Mexicas, and Aztecs. If you’re looking to spend a couple of days or more checking out a museum and understanding more about these influential cultures, the MNA is for you, because a single day won’t be enough.
The entrance fee is 3.22 USD (64 Mexican Pesos).
8. JUMEX Museum
- Location: Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra boulevard 303, Granada, Miguel Hidalgo, 11520 Mexico City
- Main feature: The first Latin American museum that the British David Chipperfield designed
Jumex Museum (El museo Jumex) is one of the museums in Mexico City that displays contemporary art. The five-floor, 72,118 square feet (6,700 square m) museum charges 2,51 USD (50 Mexican pesos) to access its facilities. If you’re too eager to visit it, you can start with an online visit.
This is another museum which changes its collections frequently, so you can revisit it and find different expositions which will amaze you and make you learn about Mexican and international art. The Mexican artist, Leo Marz will show his pieces from September 18th to November 14th 2021.
FUN FACT! Jumex is a Mexican company that makes, bottles, distributes, and sells juice all over Mexico and some other countries in Latin America. They sponsor the museum but you cannot see the juice creation process inside it.
9. Interactive Museum of Economy (MIDE)
- Location: Tacuba street 17, Centro Histórico de la Cdad. de México, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, 06000 Mexico City
- Main feature: Being an interactive economy museum in charge of the Mexican National Bank
The Interactive Museum of Economy (El Museo Interactivo de Economía – MIDE) is a museum in Mexico City that belongs to the Mexican National Bank (El banco nacional mexicano). As you can probably guess, the museum’s main topic is economy, finances, and sustainable development.
If you want to learn about what makes up the Mexican economy, this is the place to go. You can find plentiful tools, graphics, and interactive pieces of tech that will teach you all about this highly complex topic—without taking you step by step, but rather, giving you the freedom to explore whatever you want.
MIDE charges you 4.75 USD (95 Mexican pesos) to enter and explore its facilities. They are open from Friday to Sunday from 11 am to 5 pm, so take this into account when visiting Mexico City.
10. Leon Trotsky House Museum
- Location: Río Churubusco 410 avenue, Del Carmen, Coyoacán, 04100 Mexico City
- Main feature: Being Leon Trotsky’s former house
The Leon Trotsky House Museum (El museo casa León Trotsky) is a historic museum in Mexico City. The Russian Bolshevik leader fled to Mexico in 1937, and lived with Frida Kahlo and her husband for a while. Three years later he suffered a murder attempt that caused his passing one day later.
This museum, like Kahlo’s, shows Trotsky’s life throughout his personal belongings, rooms, and photographs and his wife’s too. You can find a gravestone and the ashes of the communist leader in the gravestone in the garden.
To access the museum, the fee is 2.51 USD (70 Mexican pesos). Visiting days and hours are on Tuesday and Sunday between 10 am and 5 pm.
11. Antique Toy Museum (MUJAM)
- Location: Dr Olvera street 15, Doctores, Cuauhtémoc, 06720 Mexico City
- Main feature: Having over 40,000 pieces
The Antique Toy Museum (El Museo del Juguete Antiguo México – MUJAM) you can find antique Mexican toys. What’s unique about this experience is that a place like this lets you see Mexico and its people with a different set of eyes. You can travel back in time to how Mexico was 50 years ago, and while its not the most conventional museum, you’ll be able to find many interesting figures that mark Mexico’s pop culture such as El Santo—a Mexican wrestler, and Cantinflas—a Mexican comedian (which you could consider the Mexican equivalent to Charlie Chaplin).
If you’re looking for a different museum, this is the place to visit. Alongside its 40,000 pieces, you can also find temporary expositions in which you can find more modern toys, and pop culture items. You can even find K-pop conventions and sticker exchanges there. This place charges 2.51 USD (50 Mexican pesos) to access it and promises to be an afternoon full of fun and nostalgia divided in four floors.
12. House Museum of the Untamed Memory
- Location: C. Regina 66, Centro Histórico de la Cdad. de México, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, 06000 Mexico City
- Main feature: The Mexican “dirty war” art
The house-museum of the untamed memory (El Museo Casa de la Memoria Indómita) is a museum in Mexico City that opens its doors from Tuesday to Sunday from 10am to 5pm and offers guided visits every half an hour. The entrance fee is 1 USD (25 Mexican pesos).
Here you can find pieces that are dedicated to the enforced disappearance in Mexico, especially to those who disappeared in Mexico’s “dirty war” (La guerra sucia de México). If you’re looking to learn about contemporary Mexican history, this is the place to visit.
13. Popular Art Museum (MAP)
- Location: Revillagigedo 11, Colonia Centro, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, 06050 Mexico City
- Main feature: Its pop art and everyday life utensils
The Popular Art Museum (El Museo de Arte Popular) in Mexico City presents you with four rooms filled with deco art divided in three floors.
The four rooms are:
- The essence of the Mexican popular art
- The popular art and the everyday life
- The popular art and the sacred things
- Fantastic and magical things
It is an interactive museum with computers and touch screens which you can use to help yourself learn a little bit more about what’s on display, that includes rugs, piñatas, toys, and more things. The entrance fee is 2 USD (40 Mexican pesos).
14. Cartoon Museum
- Location: Donceles 99, Centro Histórico de la Ciudad de México, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, 06020 Mexico City
- Main feature: Its historical cartoons
The Cartoon Museum (El Museo de la Caricatura) has cartoons on display that show and teach you about Mexican politics from the beginning of the 20th century. You can find Mexican presidents portrayed as old as Porfirio Díaz.
What’s great about this museum is that you won’t find big crowds visiting it. You can get to spend a good while learning a new perspective on Mexico’s history. The entrance fee is 1 USD (20 Mexican pesos).
15. Museum of Geology
- Location: Jaime Torres Bodet 176, Sta María la Ribera, Cuauhtémoc, 06400 Mexico City
- Main feature: The mammoth fossil
The museum of geology (El museo de geología) opened in 1906, and Porfirio Díaz built it. 20 years later, Mexicans found a mammoth fossil in the highway between Mexico and Puebla, which is on display today!
The museum is interactive since you can see representation, descriptions, and games that explain how the planet works. The entrance fee is 1 USD (20 Mexican pesos).
Take Your Cultural Trip in Spanish
Mexico offers a universe of art, history, world finances, and even toys! This multifaceted country will enthrall you with its great cuisine, friendly atmosphere, and fantastic culture. Break the language barrier and don’t miss out on anything on your visit to Mexico. Start now to speak Mexico’s modern language and get the best out of your travels.
By signing up for a free Spanish class you can uncover the wonders that the Spanish language has to offer and understand Mexico’s vast culture. And don’t forget the perks of becoming bilingual—according to The Economist, you can get greater earnings, anywhere between 50,000 and 125,000 USD, just by speaking another language alone.
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