What can you do in Casablanca in one day?

Casablanca is a working city, not a postcard, and most travellers only have a day before they fly out — so I build that day to show you its real character rather than chasing it for sights it doesn't have. I send people to the Hassan II Mosque first thing, ideally on the 9am or 10am guided tour. It is one of the only mosques in Morocco non-Muslims can enter, and standing under that retractable cedar roof with the Atlantic visible through the floor is genuinely breathtaking. Go early, before the light gets harsh and the tour groups thicken.

From the mosque I'd walk or take a short taxi to the Corniche in Ain Diab, where the city finally meets the ocean. This is where Casablancais actually spend their leisure time, and a long lunch at a terrace restaurant watching the surf is the most honest version of the city you'll get. If the weather's grey — and it often is here — the seafood and the people-watching still make it worthwhile.

The afternoon is for the things people don't expect: the Habous quarter, a 1930s French-built 'new medina' that's calmer and easier to navigate than the old ones in Fes or Marrakech, full of bookshops and olive stalls. Then wander the downtown Art Deco district around Place Mohammed V, where Casablanca's faded 1920s grandeur — wrought-iron balconies, cinema facades, the old Hotel Lincoln — tells the story of its boom years.

For the evening, I'm honest with my travellers: Rick's Café is a tourist creation, not a relic from the film, but it's beautifully done and a fun dinner if you lean into it. If you'd rather eat where locals do, the port-side fish restaurants near the central market serve the day's catch grilled simply, and that's my own preference. One day is genuinely enough for Casablanca — it's a place to taste, not to linger.