Tangier

Tangier lies at the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar, where the Atlantic and the Mediterranean meet, on a bay between Cap Spartel to the west and Cap Malabata to the east.¹ The city belongs to the prefecture of Tangier-Assilah and is divided into four arrondissements: Tanger-Médina, Bni Makada, Charf-Mghogha and Charf-Souani.²

In the 2024 census the municipality of Tangier had 1,275,428 inhabitants, compared with 947,952 ten years earlier.³ Over this period the prefecture of Tangier-Assilah grew by an average of 3.44 per cent a year, faster than any other province in the region; it now accounts for more than a third of the population of Tangier-Tetouan-Al Hoceima.⁴ Nationally, only Casablanca is larger.⁵

The city began as a Phoenician trading post, possibly as early as the 10th and certainly by the 8th century BC; in Roman times it was called Tingis.⁶ The traveller Ibn Battuta was born here in 1304.⁷ On 28 August 1471 Portugal took the city; in 1661 it passed to the English king Charles II as part of the dowry of the Infanta Catherine of Braganza, and on 7 February 1684 it returned to Morocco.⁸

From the English period came a harbour mole 225 metres long, which was destroyed in 1684. From 1921 the Société du port de Tanger took on the development of a modern port; between 1925 and 1933 the works included a breakwater of 960 metres.⁹ From 1925 to 1956 Tangier was an international zone.¹⁰

In 1821 the Sultan of Morocco gave the United States a building in Tangier, which served as the American mission for more than 140 years. The Tangier American Legation is the only US National Historic Landmark outside the country's territory and is now a museum, library and cultural centre.¹¹

Some 14 kilometres west of the city, Cap Spartel rises more than 315 metres above the sea.¹² Its lighthouse was built between 1861 and 1863 and brought into service with oil lamps in 1864; the tower is 25 metres high, and the light stands 95 metres above sea level.¹³ The sultan had ordered its construction at Morocco's expense; its upkeep and administration were governed by a convention concluded in Tangier on 31 May 1865 with ten states.¹⁴ The site now houses a museum of maritime signals with twelve rooms and a botanical garden with more than 150 plant species.¹⁵

With the opening of Tanger Med, about 40 kilometres east of the city, almost all the traffic of the city port moved there between the end of 2008 and the end of 2010; a project begun in 2010 has since been refocusing the old port on cruise ships and pleasure boats.¹⁶ The Tanger Med port complex comprises two ports with four container terminals with a combined capacity of 9 million TEU, plus a port for passengers and lorries.¹⁷ In 2025 it handled 11,106,164 TEU, 8.4 per cent more than the year before.¹⁸

Tanger Med is also the export port of the car industry: in 2024, 600,872 vehicles passed through its two vehicle terminals, including 368,843 from the Renault plants in Melloussa and SOMACA in Casablanca.¹⁹ During Operation Marhaba 2024 the passenger port was used by a total of 3,047,387 travellers.²⁰

On 15 November 2018 the high-speed line to Casablanca, served by the Al Boraq, was inaugurated at Tanger-Ville station.²¹ On the new section of some 180 kilometres to Kenitra trains run at up to 320 km/h, and on the upgraded network onwards to Casablanca at up to 160 km/h.²²

In 2024 Tangier was the global host city of UNESCO's International Jazz Day, the first city on the African continent to take that role. UNESCO pointed to the city's long jazz history: the pianist Randy Weston lived here for many years and worked with the Gnawa master Abdellah El Gourd.²³