Comuna 13 Graffiti Tour

What the Comuna 13 Graffiti Tour is

The Comuna 13 Graffiti Tour is a three-hour walking tour of the Medellín neighborhood that went from the most violent in the city to the most visited. We have run it for seven years and it is led by people who were born in Comuna 13 and still live there, not guides who commute in every morning from another part of town.

In three hours you climb Independencia 1, the sector with the most murals in Medellín, hear the story of each graffiti from someone who watched it being painted, taste the food we eat here every day, ride the escalators that changed the neighborhood and finish at a lookout with the whole city below. It is not a photo walk: it is the story of a neighborhood told by its people, with the murals as the excuse.

We leave every day of the year at 9:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m., in Spanish and English, from a coffee shop in the 20 de Julio neighborhood. More than 17,000 travelers have rated it on Airbnb, Viator, Tripadvisor and GetYourGuide with a 4.9 average, and Tripadvisor gave it the Travellers' Choice Best of the Best 2026.

How to get to the meeting point

We meet at Garden Coffee, Calle 38a #108-21, in the 20 de Julio neighborhood of Comuna 13. It is a regular neighborhood café, so if you arrive early you can have a coffee while you wait. Your guide wears a green shirt with their name; you cannot miss them.

By taxi, tell the driver you are going to the Comuna 13 graffiti tour in barrio 20 de Julio. Every taxi driver in Medellín knows the spot. From El Poblado or Laureles the ride takes 25 to 40 minutes depending on traffic. On Uber, DiDi or Cabify, type the full address: Calle 38a #108-21.

By public transport, take Metro line B to San Javier station, the last stop on the line. From there the 20 de Julio neighborhood is a few minutes by taxi. If you come by Metro, leave 20 minutes of margin and, if in doubt, message us on WhatsApp: we guide you in real time.

• Address: Calle 38a #108-21, 20 de Julio neighborhood, Comuna 13, Medellín.
• Metro: line B, San Javier station, then a short taxi ride.
• From El Poblado or Laureles: 25 to 40 minutes by taxi or ride app.
• The tour ends where it starts.

Is it safe to visit Comuna 13?

Yes. Comuna 13 is today one of the most visited places in Medellín, with thousands of people every day: travelers, local families, artists and vendors. The area around the escalators and the murals has a permanent presence of tourist police and of the community itself, which lives from tourism and looks after it.

What changes with a guide from the neighborhood is depth, not only safety: they know which streets to climb, whom to greet, where to eat and what story sits behind every wall. The common-sense rules of any big city apply: do not walk around holding your phone or camera out, carry only the cash you will use and ask before photographing people.

We have never had a safety incident with a traveler in seven years of tours. If something still worries you, message us before booking and we will tell you honestly how the neighborhood is that week.

History: from Operation Orión to the escalators

Comuna 13, San Javier, grew on the western hillside of Medellín between the sixties and the eighties, as families displaced from the countryside built their homes stair upon stair, without planning or services. That geography of alleys made it easy to enter and hard to control, and in the nineties urban militias, paramilitaries and gangs fought over the neighborhood street by street.

On October 16, 2002, the State launched Operation Orión: hundreds of soldiers and police officers, helicopters and days of combat inside an inhabited neighborhood. It was the largest urban military operation in Colombia's recent history and it left dead, wounded and disappeared people whose families are still looking for answers at La Escombrera, in the upper part of the comuna. On the tour we pass places that lived through those days, and the guide tells what their family saw from the window.

In December 2011 the escalators opened: 384 meters in six sections that replaced hundreds of steps residents climbed daily with groceries and children. They became the symbol of another way of intervening in a neighborhood, with infrastructure instead of tanks. Around them, hip hop and graffiti collectives turned the walls into memory: every mural says something, and many of the artists still live two blocks away.

The murals you will see and what they say

There are hundreds of murals in Comuna 13 and they change all the time: artists paint over old walls, rain fades them and the community decides what stays. Still, some images repeat because they are the neighborhood's memory: the elephants, because they never forget; the women with turbans and colored hair, who stand for the mothers who held the houses together when the men disappeared; the white handkerchiefs, which recall the march when residents took to the streets during Operation Orión to ask for the shooting to stop.

You will also see birds, open hands and words like resistance, memory and hope. None of it is random. Part of the tour is learning to read them: who painted each one, in what year, what happened on that corner and why the neighborhood chose color over silence. Many of the artists work in galleries and studios along the same route and make a living from what they sell there.

Times, duration and days

The tour lasts three hours and leaves every day of the year, including Sundays and holidays, at three times: 9:30 a.m., 1:30 p.m. and 4:30 p.m. The morning departure is the coolest and least crowded on the escalators; the 4:30 p.m. one ends with sunset from the lookout and is the favorite for photos.

Medellín has rainy seasons, mainly April to May and October to November. The tour runs in light rain; much of the route is covered and the food is tasted under a roof. In extreme weather we reschedule at no cost. Book at least a day ahead in high season: December, January, Easter week and the Flower Festival in August.

What is included and what you eat

The price includes a bilingual guide from Comuna 13, a speaker so everyone can hear when the group is large, and two tastings: patacón with hogao and the mango biche ice cream with salt and lime that we make at the house of one of our grandmothers. It also includes the escalators, the lookouts, the murals and the hip hop or breakdance shows you find along the way.

It does not include transport to the meeting point or tips, which are optional. If you want to buy something at the neighborhood shops, the artists' galleries or the craft stalls, bring cash in pesos.

Who the guides are

Jorge, Juan, Kevin, Nancy, Fernando and Andrés were born in Comuna 13 and guide in Spanish and English. Their names appear in hundreds of reviews because the tour is not a script: each of them tells the neighborhood through their own story, their family, their staircase and their corner. All of them wear a green shirt with their name.

We prefer guides from the neighborhood for a simple reason: nobody explains a mural better than the person who saw it born, and every tour leaves income in the comuna, in the shops where we eat, in the artists we visit and in the guides' families.

Tips before you come

The route has climbs, stairs and steep streets and is not wheelchair accessible; strollers get through most of it with a hand. Children are welcome from age two and the tour works well for families, although the climb tires the youngest.

• Comfortable shoes and light clothes: Medellín sits at 1,500 meters and the sun is strong.
• Sunscreen, a cap and water; there are shops along the way.
• Cash in pesos for souvenirs, art and tips.
• A charged phone: you will take a lot of photos. Ask before photographing people.
• If you have food allergies, tell us when booking and we adapt the food stops.

Price and how to book

The tour costs 85,000 Colombian pesos per person. You pay on the day, in cash in pesos or dollars, or by card. You cancel for free up to 24 hours before and, if weather or an emergency gets in the way, we reschedule at no cost.

Booking directly has one advantage over the platforms: you talk to us on WhatsApp before, during and after the tour, and the money stays in the neighborhood. Pick the date, time and number of people in the panel on this page and confirm on WhatsApp. We reply every day from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m.