The headquarters of the municipality are located in the town of Beberibe, which is situated about 80 km SE of Fortaleza, the state capital of Ceará.

[2] The municipality contains the 29,794 hectares (73,620 acres) Prainha do Canto Verde Extractive Reserve, created in 2009 to protect a fishing community after a lengthy struggle against real estate speculators.

The first register of Beberibe was in 1691, when a small cluster of buildings were built on the "sesmaria" given to Manuel Nogueira Cardoso, Sebastião Dias Freire, João Carvalho Nóbrega and Capitão Domingos Ferreira Chaves.

Beberibe, as its name origin may suggest, experienced rapid economic growth as a result of the construction of numerous sugar mills in the region.

The wealth which was produced by the rapadura industry led to the city being nicknamed "Vila Rica" (Rich Town).