El Salvador is a multi-ethnic nation, home to people of different races, ethnicity, and national backgrounds. The majority of the El Salvador population is composed of mestizos, roughly 86.3%. Mestizos are of mixed Amerindian and European ancestry (the majority of them being of Spanish descent)

Around 12.70% of El Salvador’s population is white, mostly ethnically Spanish people, while there are also Salvadorans of French, German, Swiss, English, Irish, and Italian descent.

About 0.13% of the population is black and mainly of African ancestry. Afro-Salvadorans are the descendants of the African population that were enslaved and shipped to El Salvador to work in mines in specific regions of El Salvador. 

Approx 0.23% of the population are indigenous, the descendants of the country’s original inhabitants. The ethnic groups are Kakawira which represents 0.07% of the total country’s population, Nawat (0.06%), Lenca (0.04%), and other minor groups (0.06%)

There are also small communities of Jews, Palestinian Christians, and Arab Muslims (in particular Palestinians).

The racial composition is as follows

Source: estimates