Moving to Madrid with kids and making friends tends to happen in a particular order: the children settle first, usually within a term, and the parents catch up somewhere around the second spring. Madrid is a sociable city, and families spend a great deal of time outdoors, in squares and parks, until well after dark. But the way friendships form here is different from the school gate culture most British families know, and nobody tends to explain it before you arrive.
What follows is what we would have liked to hear in our first month.
Your neighbourhood decides more than your house does
Where you live in Madrid shapes who you meet far more than it would in a British town, because so much of family life happens within a ten-minute walk. Families in the central districts live in flats, and the square or park below is effectively everyone's garden.
Chamberí is the area most often recommended to families who want to live centrally. It has good state and private schools, Parque Santander with its playgrounds and sports centre, and Plaza de Olavide, a round square surrounded by cafés where children play while parents sit. Salamanca and Retiro offer the same urban feel next to El Retiro park, at a higher price. Further out, Arturo Soria and Conde de Orgaz have more houses and gardens; Conde de Orgaz is home to the Lycée Français and has a large French-speaking community.
Many international families end up in the western and northern suburbs, such as Pozuelo de Alarcón, Aravaca, Majadahonda, Las Rozas and La Moraleja in Alcobendas, close to the big international schools. There is more space and more English spoken, but you will drive most days, and friendships tend to form inside the school rather than on the street.
The school you pick shapes your social life
This is the decision that matters most for making friends. In a Spanish state school (colegio público) or a state-funded private one (concertado), your children will be the only English speakers in the class at first, and so will you at the school gate. It is harder for a few months, then often easier, because you end up with Spanish friends who live nearby.
International schools such as the British Council School in Pozuelo, King's College in Soto de Viñuelas or the American School of Madrid give you an instant community of families in the same situation, many of whom arrived recently too. The trade-off is that those friendships can be spread across the whole region, and some of those families will move on after two or three years.
For state schools, the main application window in the Comunidad de Madrid runs in March for the following September. If you arrive mid-year, you apply through the local schooling office for your district, and you will need to be registered on the padrón, the town hall's register of residents, at your Madrid address. Sort the padrón out first; almost everything else depends on it.
Spanish parents do not do the school gate the way you expect
At the gate, most Spanish parents chat in small groups that have known each other since nursery. That can feel closed from the outside. It is rarely unfriendly, though. People are simply busy, and nobody thinks to approach the new family.
What opens doors is the parents' association (AMPA) and the school parents' group, where everything from birthday parties to lost jumpers gets organised. Ask the class teacher or another parent to add you to it in the first week. Then say yes to the first birthday invitation, even if your child barely knows the birthday girl. Birthday parties in Madrid often include the whole class, and they are where parents actually talk.
Evenings are when Madrid plays
The rhythm of the day is the biggest adjustment. Lunch is between 2pm and 4pm, and dinner rarely before 9pm. In the warmer months, playgrounds fill up between 6pm and 9pm, and you will see toddlers out at 10pm in summer. If you go to the park at 4pm, as you might at home, you may well find it empty.
Pick one park or square, go at the same time on the same days, and within a few weeks the same faces will be there. For a first try:
- Madrid Río, the long riverside park in the south-west of the centre, with some of the city's best playgrounds and space for bikes and scooters.
- El Retiro, especially around the puppet theatre (Teatro de Títeres) near the Puerta de Alcalá entrance, which puts on free shows at weekends throughout the year. Arrive early, as places are limited. The nearest metro is Retiro, on line 2.
- Parque Santander and Plaza de Olavide in Chamberí, for the classic after-school crowd.
- Casa de Campo, the huge park to the west, for weekend picnics and the lake.
Activities matter more than you think
Extracurricular classes (extraescolares) are a huge part of family life in Madrid, and they are often where friendships between parents properly start, waiting outside together twice a week. Football, swimming at the municipal sports centre (polideportivo), dance, judo and chess are the usual choices, and many run straight after school on the school premises. Choosing one at your children's school, rather than across town, means the parents you meet there are also the parents at the gate.
Summer is the other moment to plan for. Spanish schools break up in late June and return in early September, which is a long gap if you have only just arrived. Most families fill part of it with campamentos urbanos, day camps run by schools, sports centres and the town halls, and these are one of the easiest ways for a new child to meet local children of the same age outside the classroom. Places for July go early, often in spring, so ask at your school as soon as you have a place.
The city's municipal libraries are worth knowing too. They run free storytelling sessions and family activities, and they are a calm way to meet other parents with small children on a rainy afternoon.
Some Spanish speeds everything up
You can live in Madrid with very little Spanish, especially in the international bubble. But the families who make Spanish friends fastest are those where at least one parent can hold a basic conversation at the gate. Even a few months of classes changes how people respond to you. Your children will overtake you within a year, which is humbling and quite useful: they will introduce you to their friends' parents.
Moving to Madrid with kids and making friends takes a school year
Most families describe the first autumn as the hardest. Christmas helps, spring helps more, and by the second September, when you are no longer the new family, things feel very different. It is normal for it to take that long.
If you would like a head start, Woltica's My City circle lets you see families with children who live near you in Madrid, for free, and suggest meeting in a park or at the library. Writing to a family who doesn't share your school or club for the first time costs 1 credit, refunded if they don't reply within 72 hours, and you receive 3 credits when you complete your profile and the questionnaire. You can find out more at Woltica.