Cancun hoping to draw World Cup fans with sun, sand and more in 2026

The tourist board representing the state home to hugely popular Cancun is preparing to host foreigners seeking sun, sand and soccer as well in 2026.

Tourist board head Andres Martinez says it expects an influx of soccer enthusiasts in Cancun next summer bound for the interior Mexican cities that are joining other cities in Canada and the United States cohosting the World Cup soccer tournament games.

The World Cup is hugely popular internationally.

“It’s hard to know the exact number but we expect a million passengers more than we usually get in the summer,” Martinez said during late October’s Cancun Travel Mart.

The Mexican cities chosen to host World Cup games are in the central part of the country whereas Cancun is in most southeastern Mexico.

But Martinez said that Cancun has the “most international airport” in Mexico, with direct air links with all Canadian, American and Mexican cities chosen as games venues, leading him to predict that many foreign World Cup visitors will enter or leave Mexico through Cancun or both, and that many of those visitors will decide to spend time in Cancun during their time in Mexico.

“It’s a good opportunity, ” he said, adding Cancun has a “stopover strategy” for World Cup visitors.

The tourist board expects visitors will be impressed by Cancun and many will return to it for vacations.

Among those cities hosting games is Mexico City, with the Mexican capital and Cancun now linked by 32 daily flights.

Tourism authorities are confident that they will have the hotel rooms to accommodate next summer’s added visitors, with Martinez reporting Cancun’s summer occupancy rate usually hovers around 80%. “We still have that 20%.”

Two Quintana Roo hotels — the Moon Palace and Mayakoba — are expected to host World Cup teams.

Martinez noted that Cancun is continuing to make its mark in tourism, hosting 21 million visitors last year.

He noted that the Cancun area — billed by tourism authorities as the “world’s paradise ” and famed for its beaches — has 13 golf courses, the world’s second-longest coral reef and 34 “natural protected from development.

Tourism authorities are also touting a “multidimensional culinary experience” that includes Mexican and Indigenous Mayan cuisine.

In the photo

Among those on hand during Cancun Travel Mart were Marianne Volio Soto of Tica en Cancun and fellow Costa Rican Ileana Fernandez.