The Cozumel ferry, today and through the history of Playa

The crossing to Cozumel is the most used trip out of Playa del Carmen. It leaves from downtown, takes under an hour, and it is the reason this city exists where it does.

Here is what you need to take it, and where the route came from.

The pier at Avenida Juárez and Calle 1 Sur, at the end of Fifth Avenue and one block from Parque Fundadores.

It is right downtown. You can walk there from almost any hotel in the pedestrian zone, and if you take a taxi, ask for the pier and not the bus terminal, which is on a different street.

Between 35 and 45 minutes, depending on the operator and the sea.

On windy days the crossing moves. If you get seasick easily, the lower deck seats toward the center are the steadiest.

Three companies work the route.

Ultramar and Winjet have been running the crossing for years.

Xcaret Xailing started on April 1, 2024, and is the newest.

All three leave from the same pier and the schedules alternate. Frequency changes by season, so check it directly with each operator.

The companies run two fares: one for visitors and a lower one for residents of Quintana Roo or of Cozumel, shown with ID.

For a sense of scale: when Xcaret Xailing launched in April 2024, it charged 254 pesos for visitors and 87 for Cozumel residents. In 2026, Ultramar published 100 pesos one way for Quintana Roo residents.

Those figures are from their dates and they change. Check the current fare directly with each operator before you go. If you can, buy online: it locks in your seat and your departure, especially in high season.

One useful note: a round trip usually beats two one-ways.

The car ferry does not leave from the downtown pier. It leaves from Calica, also known as Punta Venado, south of Playa del Carmen.

Transcaribe and Ultracarga run it, with different schedules and fares from the passenger ferry.

Most visitors do not need a car: on Cozumel you can rent a car, a scooter or a golf cart right at the pier.

Before there were ferries, there were canoes.

The main departure port for Cozumel was Pole, the Maya site now known as Xcaret, a few kilometers south of here. From there went the pilgrims headed to the shrine of Ixchel, the goddess tied to fertility and medicine, on the island.

It was not an ordinary trip. It was one of the most important pilgrimages in the Maya world, and the canoe crossing of open water was part of the rite.

Every spring, the Travesía Sagrada Maya recreates that crossing by paddle. It is one of the few things on the Riviera Maya where you can literally see the continuity between what was here and what is here.

If that part interests you, we go into it in our piece on Playacar, which was built over another of those ports.

The modern regular crossing was started by Fernando Barbachano Herrero in 1970, with a boat he bought in Pennsylvania called the Tropic Breeze.

He is the one who tells it. It is his account, not a public record, and it is worth taking as such. What is documented is that the Barbachano family pioneered tourism on this coast and ran the first Playa to Cozumel crossings.

At 6:00, at noon, and at 18:00.

That fact explains what Playa del Carmen was like then. Anyone who missed the last boat was stranded, and that is what the Hotel Molcas was for, right next to the pier. It lived off passengers who missed the crossing.

The Molcas closed in 2015, by which point the ferry ran hourly and nobody got stranded. We cover it along with the other hotels that built the city.

In 2025 the route moved 3,853,770 passengers, according to the Quintana Roo Port Administration.

That is more than ten thousand people a day on average, counting both directions. What began with three departures and a boat bought in Pennsylvania is now one of the busiest passenger sea crossings in Mexico.

Cozumel is a big island and the ferry lands at San Miguel, its only town.

What most people come for is the reef. Palancar and the southern reefs are among the best diving and snorkeling in the Caribbean, and they sit inside a national park. There are tours that leave from there, and others you book from Playa del Carmen with the crossing included.

If you are going for the day, the practical move is the first morning ferry and back before the last afternoon one. If you stay over, check the time of the last return crossing, which changes by season.

ID, if you plan to ask for the resident fare.

Cash or card for the ticket window, though nearly all take both.

And if you get seasick, take something before boarding, not during.

Schedules, fares and operators change. The figures here carry their date and are worth confirming with each operator before you travel. Passenger numbers come from the Quintana Roo Port Administration. The story of the first boat is its protagonist's own account and is flagged as such.