Mexico City airport has no transit area: every passenger arriving from abroad passes Mexican immigration, even just to change planes. US, Canadian, British, EU and Australian passports enter without a visa. Passports that need a visa, India's among them, need a Mexican one even to connect, unless they hold a valid US, Canadian, British, Japanese or Schengen visa.
No visa is needed for US, Canadian, British, Irish, EU and Schengen, Australian, New Zealand or Japanese passports: you're admitted at the border for a visit of up to 180 days, with no form to fill in first. Other passports, India's among them, need a Mexican visa, unless they hold a valid US, Canadian, British, Japanese or Schengen visa, or residence in one of those places. There's no transit area at Mexico City airport, so this applies even if you only change planes.
If you stay airside
You can’t: at Mexico City International Airport (MEX), every passenger arriving from abroad passes Mexican immigration, even just to change planes.
There’s no transit area where you wait for your next flight without entering Mexico. So the question for a layover here isn’t whether to leave the airport but whether you can enter Mexico at all, and the answer depends only on your passport (the table below).
- Your bags. On one ticket, your bags may be checked through to your final destination, but ask your airline when you check in: if they aren’t, you collect them after immigration, take them through customs and check them in again.
- A passport that needs a visa. Mexico’s visa rule applies to passengers who only change planes, and there’s no separate transit visa. Without a Mexican visa, or one of the US, Canadian, British, Japanese or Schengen visas that stand in for it, the airline won’t board you for a connection through Mexico City.
- Flying on within Mexico. You pass immigration and customs at Mexico City, your first airport in Mexico, before the domestic flight.
- Changing terminals. Aeroméxico and its partners use Terminal 2, most other airlines Terminal 1. Between them, after immigration, a Metrobús shuttle runs every 12 minutes: getting between the terminals.
If you want to leave the airport
Since you pass immigration anyway, leaving the airport needs nothing more than changing planes does.
| Passport | What you need to leave the airport |
|---|---|
| United States | Nothing: a valid passport |
| United Kingdom and Ireland | Nothing: a valid passport |
| EU and Schengen states | Nothing: a valid passport |
| Canada | Nothing: a valid passport |
| Australia and New Zealand | Nothing: a valid passport |
| India | A Mexican visitor visa, unless you hold a valid US, Canadian, British, Japanese or Schengen visa, or residence in one of those places or in Chile, Colombia or Peru |
| Others | Check INM’s lists of passports that do and don’t need a visa |
Entering without a visa
The passports in the table, with Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Israel and the UAE among others, enter Mexico as visitors without a visa, for up to 180 days.
- No form first. At an airport there’s nothing to fill in or carry: the officer records your entry, which creates the digital form, the FMMD. You can download it from INM’s website once you’ve been admitted, but you don’t need it for a layover.
- Your passport must be valid for your whole stay. Mexico has no six-month rule, though your airline may apply its own, so check with it if your passport runs out soon.
- Questions. Visa-free entry isn’t a promise of admission: the officer can ask where you’re going and when you leave. Keep your onward boarding pass or booking to hand.
- The visitor fee. Mexico charges visitors from abroad a non-resident fee, the DNR, which airlines normally include in the ticket price. If you’re not sure your fare includes it, ask your airline.
Entering on a US, Canadian, British, Japanese or Schengen visa
This is the route for most Indian passport holders on a Mexico City layover, and for other passports that need a visa.
- Who qualifies. Anyone holding a valid visa for the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Japan or a Schengen country, or permanent residence in one of them, or in Chile, Colombia or Peru, enters Mexico without a Mexican visa, as a visitor for up to 180 days.
- Valid and current. The visa must be in date for your whole stay, and so must your passport. An expired US visa doesn’t count, even with a US work permit, an approval notice, advance parole or a student form alongside it.
- A visa you haven’t used yet. Mexico’s rules ask only that the visa be valid and current; they don’t say it must have been used before. The airline checks your documents at check-in, so if your visa has never been used, ask your airline before you fly.
The Mexican visitor visa
For a passport that needs a visa and has none of the visas above. Mexico has no transit visa, so this visitor visa is what you need, even to change planes.
- Where. At a Mexican consulate, before you travel: it can’t be issued at the airport, and you need it to board a flight to Mexico.
- Fee and timing. Check the fee and how long it takes with the consulate where you’ll apply, and start well before your trip.
If you’re on separate tickets
You collect your bags after immigration, take them through customs, and check in again for your next flight, so you need the same permission to enter Mexico as anyone leaving the airport (the table above).
Allow for check-in as well as the 90 minutes this guide asks you to be back before departure: your second airline’s own check-in deadline applies. If your next flight leaves from the other terminal, add the transfer between them.
At the border
Mexico publishes no queue times for Mexico City, so allow about 1 hour 15 minutes from landing to the Metrobús stop or the taxi booth, with your bags and customs.
- The halls. International arrivals come out in Terminal 1’s halls E1, E2 and E3, and in Terminal 2’s halls P and N, depending on where your flight came from.
- Immigration. Have your passport, any visa that lets you in, and your onward boarding pass or booking ready.
- Customs follows the baggage hall, on your way out to the arrivals hall.
- A slow queue costs you time in town, not your flight: the time you must head back stays the same.
Before you go landside
- Bags. On one ticket, check with your airline that your bags are going through. Big bags can go in left luggage on the ground floor of either terminal, open 24 hours.
- Boarding pass. Keep your onward boarding pass with you: with it and no bag to drop, you only need security on the way back.
- When to be back. At Mexico City airport 90 minutes before departure. The airport’s advice to arrive 3 hours before an international flight is for passengers checking in.
- Which airport. Check that your next flight leaves from MEX, not AIFA (NLU), the city’s other airport.
How to get into town and when to head back: getting into the city.