Mexico · Ciudad de México · Mexico City
Azcapotzalco, Mexico City — Area Guide & Where to Stay
Azcapotzalco is a borough in the north-west of Mexico City, the old Tepanec seat of Tezozómoc, ringed by industry and colonial churches.
About Azcapotzalco
Where to stay in Azcapotzalco
Each area has its own feel; here's who each one suits.
Azcapotzalco holds few tourist hotels, so most beds sit near its transport edges rather than a hotel strip. Plan around the metro. The El Rosario interchange in the north gives fast reach to central Mexico City, while the older core around the Parroquia de San Felipe y Santiago Apóstoles keeps the borough's quiet, low-rise character and puts the Museo de Azcapotzalco within a short walk.
Industry defines the east. Rooms thin out toward the Ferrería rail yards and the Vallejo works.
About Azcapotzalco
What are the main landmarks in Azcapotzalco?
The Parroquia de San Felipe y Santiago Apóstoles, raised in 1565, dominates the old centre and is said to hold the largest atrium of any church in Mexico City. It rewards a slow visit. Two museums carry the borough's memory: the Museo Tezozómoc, named for the Tepanec ruler, and the Museo de Azcapotzalco, which gathers the local record of a place whose Nahuatl name means the anthills.
Metro art marks the ground too. The Tezozómoc and Ferrería stations tie these sites to the wider Mexico City network.
What is the history of Azcapotzalco?
Azcapotzalco was the capital of the Tepanec, and under Tezozómoc, who ruled from 1367 to 1427, its power reached across much of the Valley of Mexico. That dominance did not last. When the Triple Alliance overthrew the Tepanec in 1428, the city was sacked and the young Tenochtitlan rose in its place, and Azcapotzalco slipped from a seat of empire to a village outside the growing capital.
Spanish friars later built here. The Parroquia de San Felipe y Santiago Apóstoles dates from 1565, and the district became a formal borough of Mexico City in 1928.
Where is Azcapotzalco?
Azcapotzalco spreads across the flat floor of the Valley of Mexico in the north-west of Mexico City, sharing its southern edge with the Miguel Hidalgo borough, its low grid broken by the Ferrería rail yards and the Vallejo industrial belt.
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Updated July 2026