Mexicans love to travel. Whether for a vacation or a day trip, the main appeal is spending quality time with friends and family. But when going new places isn’t an option, many opt to follow influencers in their travels – the most famous being YouTuber Luisito Comunica, with 33 million followers. Prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, we conducted quantitative research on Mexicans’ travel habits, comparing their tendencies to their global peers.

Here’s some of what we learned:

Mexicans are far more likely to commemorate reunions, anniversaries, and birthdays with trips. For Mexicans, the main appeal of travel is being able to spend quality time with loved ones. They primarily celebrate birthdays with trips (55%), followed by family reunions (39%) and anniversaries (28%). Compared with people globally, Mexicans are 56% more likely to travel for a family reunion, 40% more likely to travel for an anniversary, and 34% more likely to travel for a birthday.

They take an average of 4 vacations per year, mostly within Mexico. Mexican travel at a similar rate to their global peers. On average, they take 4 vacations annually in which they stay in paid accommodations. This breaks out to 3 domestic trips and 1 international trip.

They average 6 day trips annually. Mexicans take day trips at about the same rate as their global peers. These trips are mainly local events (69%), music concerts (66%), theme parks (65%), water parks (63%), and live sports (56%). Compared with people globally, they are 34% more likely to go to water parks, 27% more likely to go to concerts or live sports events, and 14% more likely to go to theme parks.

Women tend to do the planning. When it comes to who organizes vacations and day trips, Mexican women are slightly more likely to say it’s their responsibility (52%).

Kids and teens influence family travel decisions – especially for day trips. For family vacations, most Mexican parents say they primarily influence where to go (82%) and what to do (73%). For day trips, however, parents in Mexico are less likely than parents elsewhere to say they have the most influence (65% vs. 70% globally). Mexican parents are more likely than their global peers to say their kids under age 18 are the main influence on how to spend day trips (25% vs. 18% globally). Teens in Mexico believe that they are most influential in decisions about day trips (59% vs. 49% globally).