Born in the nation forged from the Mexican Revolution, the El Universal newspaper was celebrating its centennial in 2016 as a privileged witness to history and an example of the media's evolution in the era of globalization, the Internet and social networks.

On Oct. 1, 1916, prominent engineer Felix Fulgencio Palavicini founded El Universal "to report on the social changes that Mexico was demanding" in the first quarter of the 20th century.

The paper was started with an investment of 50,000 gold pesos, printing 60,000 copies to be sold at 40 cents apiece. The first editorial offices were located at the corner of Madero and Motolinia streets in downtown Mexico City.

The original masthead read "El Diario Politico de la Mañana" (The Political Morning Daily).

El Universal currently prints 180,000 copies and has an average daily readership of 285,000, according to consulting firm Ipsos EGM, making it the leader in Mexico's print media.

In 2013 the El Universal website claimed to have an average of more than 16 million unique visitors each month, with 140 million page views, and 4 million followers on Facebook.

Aviso Oportuno is the classifieds service of El Universal. The brand has become widely known in Mexico, and the phrase Aviso Oportuno is sometimes used as a generic term for the classifieds business. This brand has four subsites: Inmuebles, Vehículos , Empleos and Varios (Real Estate, Vehicles, Jobs and Miscellaneous).

According to Statista, El Universal is the most visited online news brand in Mexico, accounted for 30 percent of respondents at the beginning of 2020.

According to Statista and efe.com