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destination · Tulum
Tulum in 2026: coastal occupancy fell to 30 per cent, the beach fee got rolled back, and the sargassum arrived early
Review of Tulum
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Share your experienceTulum is the clearest example anywhere of a destination pricing itself out of its own market, and 2025 and 2026 are the years the numbers stopped being deniable. Hotel occupancy in the coastal zone fell to 49.2 per cent in September 2025 against 66.7 per cent in the same month of 2024, a drop of 17.5 percentage points. Over the summer, coastal occupancy hit 30 per cent and the town centre reached just 15 per cent. Meanwhile average nightly hotel rates reached about 450 dollars in 2025, up roughly 25 per cent from 2023. Rates went up 25 per cent while occupancy collapsed, which is not a demand problem, it is a pricing decision. The on-the-ground version of that is a stack of small charges that add up to a bad day. Taxi fares can reach 25 dollars for short rides in a town where almost everything is on one road. Beach clubs generally require a minimum consumption of 500 to 800 pesos per person before you get a lounger. Restaurant and bar pricing on the hotel-zone strip is closer to Miami than to Mexico. Local business coverage has been blunt about the mechanism: Tulum built a reputation on overpricing visitors, and its own businesses are now paying for it as those visitors go elsewhere. The beach-access fight is the part that changed most recently, and it changed in visitors' favour. The creation of Parque Nacional del Jaguar, a federal protected area covering much of Tulum's coastline, introduced entry fees on beaches that had previously been free, with foreigners paying 415 pesos, about 22 dollars. That became the single most criticised policy on the Riviera Maya. On 17 July 2026, during a visit to Quintana Roo, President Sheinbaum confirmed that entry to Parque del Jaguar is now free for national visitors, and that the Tulum archaeological zone fee has been cut to 80 pesos for Mexican nationals and 265 pesos for foreign visitors. If you were quoted 415 pesos by an old blog post or an aggressive tout, that number is out of date. The environmental problem is not out of date. Sargassum, the brown seaweed that mats the shoreline and rots in the sun, arrived unusually early in 2026 and is running well ahead of previous years. More than 2,450 tonnes had already been cleared from Tulum's beaches by mid-2026, and the Mexican Navy had removed 39,500 tonnes from the Quintana Roo coast, already exceeding the entire 2024 season before the peak months. Thirteen vessels and 191 personnel were deployed to intercept it offshore. Forecasts point to a record season. This is the single biggest determinant of whether your beach photos look like the brochure, and it is seasonal: check a live sargassum report for your dates rather than trusting any image you have seen. Access has genuinely improved even as demand has fallen. Tulum's own airport, Felipe Carrillo Puerto International, opened in December 2023, and the Tren Maya connects Cancun Airport to Tulum via Playa del Carmen, with the Merida to Tulum route fully operational since 2024. The catch is that the airline market is retreating with the tourists: Delta is dropping nonstops from both Minneapolis and Detroit, and American, Delta, JetBlue and United are all cutting total winter capacity into the airport. Core hub routes from Atlanta, Houston, Miami and Dallas remain solid, but if you are flying from a secondary city, check that the route still exists before you build a trip around it. On safety, keep it in proportion. As of July 2026 the US State Department has Quintana Roo at Level 2, Exercise Increased Caution, which is the same tier as France, Germany and the United Kingdom. A wave of cartel-related violence flared across several Mexican states in February 2026 and briefly touched parts of the Caribbean coast, prompting short-lived heightened caution, but Quintana Roo stayed at Level 2 throughout and tourist operations continued. The underlying place is still there: a Maya walled city on a cliff above the Caribbean, cenotes inland, and the Sian Ka'an biosphere reserve to the south. Tulum's problem was never the scenery. It is that a decade of charging Miami prices for a beach town has left it with Miami prices and half the guests, and the correction is now visibly under way.
What was great
The Maya ruins sit on a limestone cliff directly above the Caribbean, which is a setting nowhere else in Mexico can match, and the archaeological zone fee has just been cut to 265 pesos for foreign visitors. Access is easier than it has ever been, with Tulum's own airport open since December 2023 and the Tren Maya running from Cancun Airport via Playa del Carmen. The inland cenotes and the Sian Ka'an biosphere to the south are largely untouched by the strip's pricing problem. And with coastal occupancy at 30 per cent, there is real negotiating room.
What nearly ruined the trip
The bill. Average nightly hotel rates hit about 450 dollars in 2025, up 25 per cent from 2023, while coastal occupancy fell to 49.2 per cent in September 2025 from 66.7 per cent a year earlier and to 30 per cent over the summer. Short taxi rides can cost 25 dollars and beach clubs demand 500 to 800 pesos per person in minimum consumption. Sargassum arrived early in 2026 with over 2,450 tonnes cleared from Tulum's beaches and 39,500 tonnes from the Quintana Roo coast, and airlines including Delta, American, JetBlue and United are cutting capacity into the airport.
Safety
★★★☆☆ MixedValue for money
★★☆☆☆ OverpricedComments
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