With over 5,800 miles of shoreline and seashores on each the Pacific Ocean and Caribbean Sea, Mexico competes solely with The Bahamas because the nation that sees the very best variety of cruise ship guests on the planet.
The 11.2 million vacationers who disembarked at ports like Cozumel and Costa Maya on 3,156 ships docking in 2025 is, in accordance with the Mexican authorities’s statistics, a 11.2% improve from the earlier years.
Whether or not they come by air, highway or ship, any traveler who steps onto Mexican soil is topic to each its common and customs import legal guidelines. With regards to the latter, a brand new ban prohibiting the “import, sale, and marketing of vapes and e-cigarettes” put in place as a part of a wider well being reform by the Mexican Chamber of Deputies has come into impact in January 2026 and now impacts any traveler who tries to enter the nation with certainly one of these things — in accordance with Mexican legislation, having certainly one of these things for private use nonetheless classifies as “import” when crossing the border into the nation.
Mexico to “penalize all activities related to electronic cigarettes, vaping devices and other analogous systems”
“The law will penalize all activities related to electronic cigarettes, vaping devices, and other analogous electronic systems or devices specified by law,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo wrote in a press release on the brand new legislation initially in Spanish.
Actual penalties might vary from easy confiscation to a tremendous of as much as $12,500 USD and potential jail time if these things are present in massive portions. Consequently, journey companies have been warning vacationers on cruises originating within the U.S. to familiarize themselves on the adjustments and go away any vapes or e-cigarettes permitted by the cruise firm of their cabin when disembarking at a Mexican port.
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The ban additionally applies to paraphernalia comparable to disposables, pods and refillable cartridges.
“If you get arrested, your cruise line will not help you,” says TravelHost’s Come Cruise With Me Editor in Chief Daniel Kline. “If you miss the ship, which will not wait for you, it is your responsibility to get to the next port or to get home.”
The brand new Mexican ban on vapes impacts vacationers coming into the nation by highway, airplane or cruise ship.
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So what occurs in the event you by chance get off in Mexico with a vape?
With the ban in place since January, Mexican customs officers have begun confiscating as much as 50,000 vapes per day at varied entry factors to the nation.
At at time when vape gross sales had been nonetheless authorized in Mexico, the e-cigarette market was estimated to be price as much as $1.5 billion. In line with early experiences, manufacturing and gross sales have already moved to an underground market managed by cartels on condition that demand for these units within the nation stays excessive.
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On the traveler finish, a mistake or not maintaining with the legislation can find yourself being expensive; tales of vacationers who ended up getting fined have already began to emerge on varied cruise and Mexican journey boards.
“I had to sign a form releasing my electric vape to the Mexican government, they took $480 cash and let me go,” one traveler wrote on the r/MexicoTravel discussion board on Reddit. “Please don’t bring a vape to Mexico!”
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