Taking Pesos to Mexico?

It's according to where you're going in Mexico.

I found in Oaxaca that pesos were very much appreciated, and in fact, pretty much required. I carried a lot of smaller denominations like 20 and 50 peso bills. 100s are good for restaurants. I never used the 500s I brought. Also, make sure to carry coins for the washrooms as they don't accept bills.

US cash isn't accepted as a form of payment in Mexico, at least from my experience.

Happy travels,

-- Mike Beebe

I don't know where you're going in Mexico, but ATMs are ubiquitous and are likely to give you a better exchange rate than if you buy pesos in advance.

US dollars will not be accepted. (Maybe in some border towns, and as a tip for a taxi driver from the airport, they aren't going to turn it down if that's all you have.)

As above, get your pesos at a bank ATM with your credit card that charges the least conversion percentage ( usually 3%). Do NOT select DCC or “dynamic currency conversion” offered by the ATM as this is completely unnecessary and a way for the bank owning the ATM to gouge you further.

Similarly, at any shop or restaurant where you are paying with a credit card- PAY IN PESOS with your credit card. Paying in US dollars is just a way for the banks to profit even more on the transaction and it does nothing for you.
Use pesos with local shops and restaurants. Merchants will sometimes allow you to use dollars but they often will add a 20%-25% service fee or their conversion rate will be terrible.
While in Mexico just a week ago, a cafe we ate at said I could pay in US dollars— but at a rate of 15 pesos per dollar. The bank rate is currently about 20 pesos per dollar so the cafe was looking to profit an additional 33%. if I paid with dollars.

The easy way to guestimate the dollar cost of things priced in pesos is to get rid of the last zero and divide by 2. So for something priced at 200 pesos, get rid of the last zero (200 becomes 20) and divide by 2. ( 20/2=10). So, 200 pesos roughly equals $10.
1,000 pesos =$50 approximately.

Once in Mexico, get pesos at an ATM and pay in pesos throughout your trip with cash or credit cards.

One caveat to the generally good advice from the previous posters: using your credit card at an ATM is categorized as a Cash Advance - not a simple withdrawal from your checking account - and carries with it extra service fees and high interest rates. You'll also need a PIN for your CC in order for it to work in a foreign ATM.
Better (I think) to just use your regular bank debit card the same way you use it at home to withdraw cash from your account. I make it a point to only use secure bank ATM's during business hours ... just in case the machine eats my card or some other issue arises. Have never had a problem using my debit during numerous visits throughout Mexico.

When we've been to Mexico, in the tourist areas, street and market vendors just threw out USD numbers without doing an exchange rate calculation. They knew most Americans wouldn't know the difference. Also, any USD you take should be clean, unwrinkled, intact, and un-mutilated. They wouldn't take them if not fresh.

And if you bring some pesos back with you, note that US banks may not take ones that are older than 10 years.

Thank you! I will make sure they take pesos with them.

US dollars will not be accepted. (Maybe in some border towns,

I would add any tourist destination will have vendors that take Dollars eagerly, but at a very poor exchange rate, or just quote Dollars with no relation to Pesos. Towns up and down the Yucatan Coast would be like this, as well as other areas Americans congregate.

As others said, just get Pesos from an ATM.

If you're a AAA customer, you can buy pesos at a fairly reasonable rate (along with euros and pounds).

-- Mike Beebe

You will have no use for United states currency in Mexico but its a waste of money in fees to get pesos in advance.

In August 2023 i went to Mexico City, teotihuacan, Puebla, Oaxaca City, Mitla and Hierve el Agua in Oaxaca state. On the way to my first hotel I signed up for a taxi at a. Ooth at the airport. I paid with a debit card. I took some pesos out of my account from an automatic teller machine twice in the 15 days I was in the country. The chain grocery stores will take cards or cash. For the subway I don't remember a ticket machine. I remember buying tickets from a person at a booth. They had a low ability or no ability to make change for but bills. I paid for 3 taxi s in Oaxaca in cash. They probably wouldn't have had card machines. The markets that are like warehouses with multiple vendors selling produce and low end restaurants and clothes or souvineers probably only take cash. I didn't get pesos before I arrived in Mexico. I don't know whether i could have gone into a bank during business hours and asked for change for a big bill. Before your trip you might want to go on ebay or Amazon and look for a little zippered pouch to hold peso coins. But coins less than a peso are rarely used.

To complicate matters a little, the "$" is used in Mexico to indicate pesos. There are "$1" and "$5" bills in Mexico, but theirs' are
pesos. ATM's are not uncommon in the locations I know (Mexico City and Guadalajara) but many items you may encounter are sold by merchants with no credit card terminals. For what it's worth - when I visit Mexico, I only use cash - Mexican cash. As Mike Beebe indicates, AAA is a good source for pesos (if you are a member).
Mike contributed an excellent travel report on Oaxaca a few months back - very worthwhile reading.

Your bank may cut a deal on foreign currency if you’re a long time customer…came as a surprise to me. For a few dollars I always feel better having something local in my pocket upon arrival, maybe just $100 worth in small denominations. It’s easy enough to spend a small amount of cash most anywhere. Safe travels.