Puerto Vallarta, Jalisco, Sept. 25, 2026 — Puerto Vallarta’s tourism trust joined a Sept. 7-9 course on LGBTQ+ weddings as it promotes the city for ceremonies and honeymoons.
The course in Costa Mujeres drew 70 wedding and travel professionals, according to a report published Sept. 17. Sessions covered client service, pronouns, marriage law and wedding marketing.
The trust’s wedding guide promotes LGBTQ+ planners, hotels and celebrations. It also presents the Romantic Zone and South Zone as places for guests to spend time around a wedding.
What the promotion means locally
The trust’s outreach connects its destination pitch to planners, photographers, hotels and other wedding suppliers. The September course included professionals from those trades, though the reported attendance figure does not identify how many were from Puerto Vallarta.
For couples planning a legal ceremony, the city’s Civil Registry has a separate role. We reviewed its marriage requirements, which direct applicants to the office at Independencia 123 in Centro.
Foreign applicants must provide apostilled or legalized birth documents, authorized Spanish translations, passports and documentation of their legal stay. The city also requires a DIF premarital course, medical paperwork and two witnesses.
The tourism office’s guide distinguishes a civil marriage from a symbolic celebration: Only the civil ceremony has legal effect in Mexico.
Promotion and inclusion
The wedding pitch sits alongside concerns raised by local LGBTQ+ advocates. A submission from Red Diversidad Vallarta included in the city’s 2024-27 development plan transparencia described “a gap between this image and the institutional reality,” translated from Spanish. It also raised concerns about conditions for LGBTQ+ tourism workers.
That submission predates the city’s installation of a municipal diversity council in June 2026. The September wedding course concerns tourism promotion and professional training; it is not a new marriage policy.
