Casablanca, Morocco's largest city and economic capital with a metropolitan population of 4.3 million, sprawls along the Atlantic coast as the nation's commercial powerhouse, industrial center, and principal port handling over half of Morocco's international trade. Known in Arabic as "Ad-Dār al-Bayḍāʾ" (The White House) and Portuguese as "Casa Branca," both meaning White City, Casablanca combines French colonial architecture, modernist boulevards, traditional medinas, and contemporary business districts into a cosmopolitan metropolis that accounts for over 50% of Morocco's industrial production. While tourists often bypass Casablanca for the imperial cities of Fez, Marrakech, and Rabat, the city represents modern Morocco's economic heart, where gleaming headquarters of Moroccan corporations and international firms rise alongside the magnificent Hassan II Mosque, one of the world's largest mosques with its 210-meter minaret towering over the Atlantic. The city's identity blends Moroccan tradition with French colonial legacy and global business culture, creating an urban character more focused on commerce than tourism, though the romantic 1942 film "Casablanca" starring Humphrey Bogart—ironically shot entirely in Hollywood—created enduring associations with wartime intrigue despite bearing little relation to the actual city.

The Hassan II Mosque dominates Casablanca's waterfront, its minaret soaring 210 meters as Africa's tallest minaret and one of the world's tallest religious structures, this architectural masterpiece designed by French architect Michel Pinseau and completed in 1993 after six years of construction costing $585 million largely funded by public subscription. The mosque dramatically overhangs the Atlantic Ocean, its location inspired by Quranic verse stating God's throne was built upon water, capable of accommodating 105,000 worshippers (25,000 inside, 80,000 in courtyards), with elaborate tile work, carved cedar ceilings, marble columns, and a retractable roof allowing open-air prayers. The Old Medina, though smaller and less touristy than Fez or Marrakech, preserves traditional Moroccan urban fabric with narrow alleys, souks selling spices and handicrafts, and the defensive walls remnants of earlier Portuguese and Moroccan fortifications. The Corniche beachfront district offers upscale restaurants, clubs, and beach resorts popular with Casablanca's affluent residents and Gulf Arab tourists, while the Art Deco architecture of downtown Casablanca reflects 1920s-30s French colonial urban planning, creating a unique Maghrebi variant of modernist style. Rick's Café, opened in 2004 by American diplomat, recreates the fictional bar from the Bogart film as a tourist attraction and upscale restaurant, capitalizing on Hollywood-created mythology despite the movie's actual disconnect from Casablanca.

Casablanca's economy drives Morocco's development through the Port of Casablanca handling 50% of national trade, phosphate exports (Morocco possesses 75% of world reserves), manufacturing including automobiles, electronics, textiles, and food processing, financial services with Morocco's stock exchange and major banks headquartered here, and construction fueling urban expansion. The Casablanca Finance City initiative positions the city as North Africa's financial hub rivaling Cairo and Lagos. Despite economic vitality, Casablanca grapples with inequality, traffic congestion, housing shortages creating bidonvilles (shantytowns), and tensions between modernizing elites and traditional populations. The city ranks 54th globally in financial center rankings, demonstrating growing importance while facing infrastructure and governance challenges common to rapidly developing cities.