Minas Gerais · Brazil
Belo Horizonte travel guide
Belo Horizonte is a city in Minas Gerais, Brazil, home to about 2,316,000 people.
- Best months
- May to September
- Nearest airport
- CNF33 km · Tancredo Neves International Airport
- Currency
- BRLBrazilian real
- Time zone
- America/Sao Paulo
- Language
- Portuguese, Brazilian Sign Language
About
About Belo Horizonte
Belo Horizonte is the sixth-largest city in Brazil, with a population of around 2.4 million, and the third largest metropolitan area, containing a population of 6 million. It is the 13th-largest city in South America and the 18th-largest in the Americas.
Founded in 1897, Belo Horizonte (or simply "BH" (beh-ah-GAH) to locals) is a little over a century old. With a metropolitan population reaching more than 5 million (edging out Salvador), it was built as a planned city to take the place of Ouro Preto as the state's capital. Its layout features square sections delineated by broad avenues, intersected diagonally by smaller streets. The city lies in the center of the Minas Gerais state, and was intended to bring together the many parts of this very diverse state.
Wikipedia and Wikivoyage contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0; excerpted.
Things to do
What to see and do in Belo Horizonte
See
Note that a lot of places including museums, the parque municipal and the Mangueira park are closed on Mondays.
- Pampulha
- Mineirão Stadium
- Mangabeiras Park
- Praça da Liberdade
- Museum of Arts and Crafts
- Alta Vila Tower
- Parque Municipal
- Museu de Ciencias Naturais
- Museu Histórico Abílio Barreto
Wikivoyage contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0; excerpted.
Where to stay
Which part of Belo Horizonte to stay in
Major high-rise hotels are generally on Av. Afonso Pena or at Savassi neighborhood, while mid-range and budget accommodations are clustered around the train station.
Wikivoyage contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0; excerpted.
When to go
The best time to visit Belo Horizonte
The most comfortable months for a city stay in Belo Horizonte are May to September. February is the warmest month, with average highs of 29 °C; December is the wettest, with about 357 mm of rain.
Comfortable means average daytime high between 18 °C and 29 °C and under 80 mm of rain in the month. Averages for 1991–2020 over the surrounding area, a grid square about 50 km across, so a coast or a nearby mountain can make the town itself warmer or cooler. Data: CRU TS v4.10, Climatic Research Unit, University of East Anglia (Open Database License).
Getting there
Getting to Belo Horizonte: airports and arrival
The nearest airport with scheduled flights is Tancredo Neves International Airport (CNF), about 33 km from the city centre in a straight line.
Getting around
If you plan to get around the city center on foot, you might want to take a map. Because the city grid is laid out with both ordinal and diagonal streets, it is very easy to take a wrong turn. Also, the land where the city was built has plenty of hills, so one should wear comfortable shoes to go up and down the streets. At night, stay on the main avenues and streets for safety, because it can be dangerous. BH is well served by buses. The SC buses circulate through the downtown area; others serve outlying neighborhoods.
Wikivoyage contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0; excerpted.
CNF · Tancredo Neves International Airport
Local knowledge
Eating, drinking and staying safe in Belo Horizonte
Eat
Minas Gerais is renowned for its cuisine across Brazil, and is the origin of many famous foods such as pão de queijo (small baked roll made with cheese and cassava flour) and feijoada (black bean and meat stew). Like elsewhere in Brazil, restaurant food is typically served in some variation of a buffet.
Stay safe
When crossing the street, watch for motorcycles, which can appear out of nowhere and sometimes ignore stop signs. At some intersections with divided streets, you can cross only one side at once. Minas has both the military police (polícia militar) who are the enforcers of the law at street level, however not linked to the Brazilian Military and the civilian police (polícia civil) who conduct further investigations like the British CID. Most officers don't have a knowledge of basic English. The uniform of the Minas Gerais state military police is brown. The emergency number (by which you can reach the military police) is 190.
Wikivoyage contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0; excerpted.
Questions
Belo Horizonte: questions travellers ask
When is the best time to visit Belo Horizonte?
The most comfortable months for a city stay in Belo Horizonte are May to September. February is the warmest month, with average highs of 29 °C; December is the wettest, with about 357 mm of rain.
Which airport is closest to Belo Horizonte?
The nearest airport with scheduled flights is Tancredo Neves International Airport (CNF), about 33 km from the city centre in a straight line.
What currency is used in Belo Horizonte?
Brazilian real (BRL).
Nearby
Destinations near Belo Horizonte
Sources: city facts from Wikidata and Wikipedia; airports from OurAirports; climate from CRU TS v4.10 (University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit), 1991–2020 monthly means, 0.5° grid; places to stay, guest scores and amenities from each operator's own public pages. How this guide is made.