A little reason to celebrate

National Tequila Day

Drink · July 24

A day for tequila, the Mexican spirit distilled from blue agave, and for the sipping, mixing and label reading that come with it.

National Tequila Day falls on Saturday, July 24, 2027. That is 270 days away.

Tequila starts as a plant. Blue agave grows for years in the fields of western Mexico before its heart, called the piña, is harvested, cooked, crushed and fermented. The juice is then distilled into a spirit that takes its name from the town of Tequila in the state of Jalisco.

The bottle tells you a lot if you know how to read it. Blanco is clear and usually unaged, with a bright, peppery agave flavor. Reposado has rested in oak for a while and picks up a softer, rounder taste. Añejo stays in the barrel longer and leans toward caramel and vanilla. A label that says 100% agave means the spirit was made only from agave sugars, while a mixto blends in other sugars.

Most people meet tequila in a margarita, which is lime, orange liqueur and tequila, often in a salt-rimmed glass. The paloma is its quieter cousin, built with grapefruit soda and a squeeze of lime, and it may be the more common order in Mexico. Plenty of drinkers prefer a good reposado neat, in a small glass, sipped slowly the way people treat whiskey.

Agave is not a cactus, despite how it looks in the field. It is a succulent, related more closely to plants like yucca, and its spiky leaves are trimmed away by workers called jimadores, who harvest the piñas by hand with a flat, round-bladed tool called a coa.

Ways to celebrate

Taste a blanco and a reposado side by side and compare notes.
Mix a paloma with grapefruit soda and fresh lime.
Read a tequila label and look for the 100% agave mark.
Make a zero-proof margarita with lime, orange juice and salt.

Dates

Year	Date
2026	Friday, July 24
2027	Saturday, July 24
2028	Monday, July 24
2029	Tuesday, July 24
2030	Wednesday, July 24

All national days on July 24

Also on July 24

Categories: Drink days