Templo Mayor
The great temple of Tenochtitlán, found under the colonial city while digging for electricity.
Duration
1 hr 30 min – 2 hrs 30 min
Best time
At opening
Open
Closed Monday
Entry price
100 MXN
The great temple of Tenochtitlán was found by accident in 1978: electricity company workers struck an eight-tonne monolith of the goddess Coyolxauhqui, a few metres from the cathedral.
Excavation has uncovered seven successive states of the temple, nested inside one another — the Aztecs rebuilt over it every fifty-two years. The adjoining museum shows over seven thousand objects taken from the offerings laid in the foundations.
Getting there
At the north-east corner of the Zócalo, behind the cathedral. Metro line 2, Zócalo station.
What the price covers
site and museum; free for under-13s, students, teachers and over-60s, and on Sunday for residents. Closed Monday.
What to bring
- 1.5 L of water
- Cap
Rules on site
The site is open to the sky, unshaded, and walked on narrow gangways: avoid the middle of the day. The indoor museum is worth as much as the ruins and is best seen second, in the shade.
Checked on 29 August 2026 at Museo del Templo Mayor — services
Other places in Mexico City
- Zócalo and cathedralThe largest square in Latin America, built on the Aztec ceremonial centre.
- TeotihuacánThe Pyramid of the Sun and the Avenue of the Dead, a city abandoned a thousand years before the Aztecs.
- Coyoacán and the Casa AzulThe colonial quarter where Frida Kahlo was born, lived and died, in a blue house.
- Chapultepec ParkThe largest urban park in Latin America, with the anthropology museum inside it.