The Maya first established city-states in southern Yucatán around AD 550 and by 850 new Mayan civilizations began to flourish in the north. The last of the great Mayan capitals, Mayapán, started to collapse around 1440, when the Xiú Maya and the Cocom Maya began a violent, protracted struggle for power. In 1540, Spanish conquistador Francisco de Montejo the Younger (son of legendary conquistador Francisco de Montejo the Elder) utilized the tensions between the still-feuding Mayan sects to finally conquer the area. The Spaniards allied themselves with the Xiú against the Cocom, finally defeating the Cocom and gaining the Xiú as reluctant converts to Christianity.

Francisco de Montejo the Younger, along with his father, Francisco de Montejo the Elder, and cousin (named… you guessed it, Francisco de Montejo) founded Mérida in 1542, and within four years brought most of the Yucatán Peninsula under Spanish rule. The Spaniards divided up the Mayan lands into large estates where the native people were put to work as indentured servants. When Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821, the new Mexican government used the Yucatecan territory to create huge plantations for the cultivation of tobacco, sugarcane and henequén (agave rope fiber). The Maya, though legally free, were enslaved in debt peonage to the rich landowners. In 1847, after being oppressed for nearly 300 years by the Spanish and their descendants, the Maya rose up in a massive revolt, massacring whole towns full of ladinos (whites). This was the beginning of the War of the Castes, the most organized rebellion the Americas had witnessed since the time of the Spanish Conquest.

Finally, in 1901, after more than 50 years of sporadic but often intense violence, a tentative peace was reached; however, it would be another 30 years before the territory of Quintana Roo came under official government control. To this day some Maya do not recognize that sovereignty. The commercial success of Cancún in the early 1970s led to hundreds of kilometers of public beach along the Caribbean coast being sold off to commercial developers, displacing many small fishing communities.

Playa del Carmen remained a sleepy fishing village until Cozumel took off as a world-class scuba diving destination and the ferry service from Playa was established.

For quite a few years travelers only passed through Playa del Carmen to catch the Cozumel-bound ferry, but as Cancún's popularity has grown, so has the number of travelers roaming this part of the Yucatán Peninsula. Many travelers now find Playa del Carmen a more laid back place to hang out than Cancún.