Iloilo City

Iloilo City, officially the City of Iloilo (Hiligaynon: Dakbanwa sang Iloilo; Tagalog: Lungsod ng Iloilo; Spanish: Ciudad de Iloílo), is a highly urbanized city in the Western Visayas region of the Philippines, located on the southeastern coast of the island of Panay. In the 2024 census, Iloilo City had a population of 473,728 people, making it the most populous city in Western Visayas. For the Iloilo–Guimaras metropolitan area, the total population is 1,039,935 people.

The city is a conglomeration of former towns, now organized into seven geographical or administrative districts: the City Proper, Jaro, Molo, Mandurriao, La Paz, Arevalo, and Lapuz. It is the largest city and capital of Iloilo, where the city is geographically situated and grouped under the Philippine Statistics Authority, but remains politically independent in terms of government and administration. Iloilo City is the regional center of Western Visayas and serves as the hub for trade, commerce, industry, education, religion, healthcare, tourism, culture, and culinary arts.

In 1566, the Spanish settled in Iloilo, establishing it as the second Spanish colonial center in the Philippines after Cebu. The city was bestowed with the honorific title "La Muy Leal y Noble Ciudad" (Most Loyal and Noble City) by Queen Regent María Cristina of Spain in recognition of its loyalty to the Spanish crown during the Philippine Revolution. Iloilo City served as the last capital of the captaincy general of the Spanish East Indies before the Philippines was ceded to the United States in 1898 through the Treaty of Paris. At the turn of the 20th century, Iloilo City was considered the second most important city in the Philippines, next to Manila, and was widely known as the "Queen City of the South."

Recognized as a UNESCO Creative City of Gastronomy, Iloilo City is known for its signature dishes such as La Paz Batchoy, Pancit Molo, Kadyos-Baboy-Langka (KBL), Laswa, and Kansi. Iloilo City has several heritage sites from the Spanish and American colonial periods, including the Calle Real Heritage Zone. Iloilo City is considered a pilgrim city and is known as the center of Candelaria devotion in the Philippines, as it home to the Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria de Jaro, the first Marian image in Asia to be canonically crowned in person by a pope, now Saint John Paul II. The city is known for the Dinagyang Festival, a popular cultural and religious festival held every January, in honor of Santo Niño.

Iloilo City is among the fastest-developing cities in the Philippines, experiencing significant annual growth since the redevelopment of the old airport in Mandurriao. The IT-BPM industry in the city continues to thrive and remains in high demand. It has been recognized as a top location for outsourcing expansion outside Metro Manila and is the third-largest hub for the industry in the country.

The name "Iloilo" is derived from the older name "Irong-irong" (Philippine Spanish: Ilong̃-ílong̃) meaning "nose-like", referring to the promontory between two rivers (Iloilo and Batiano) where the Fort San Pedro and the 17th-century Spanish port were located.

The earliest written reference to Iloilo appears in Yuan Dynasty records from the 1300s, identifying Oton—west of Iloilo City—as in Hokkien Chinese: 啞陳; Pe̍h-ōe-jī: A-tân, a bustling trade outpost in the Visayas. Although, little is known historically about the region prior to the arrival of the Spanish, Jesuit missionary Francisco Ignacio Alcina, in his 1668 work Historia natural del sitio, fertilidad y calidad de las Islas e Indios de Bisayas, identifies the Hiligaynon people originated from Leyte, aligning with linguistic subgrouping of the Hiligaynon language.

Local legends, notably the epic Maragtas by Pedro Monteclaro (published 1907), offer a different origin story. It describes how ten datus, led by Datu Puti, fled Borneo to escape the tyrant Sultan Makatunaw, arriving in Panay and purchasing its lowlands from the Ati king Marikudo with a golden salakot and a necklace for his queen, Maniwan-tiwan. The transaction, followed by a pact of friendship, is said to have inspired the Dinagyang Festival.