A popular recreational area,[citation needed] the landscape is characterized by forests, predominantly oaks, by vineyards and by orchards.

In the aftermath of the Ottoman defeat at the 1683 Battle of Vienna, the depopulated area was re-settled with "Danube Swabian" (most of them actually descending from Lorraine, the Palatinate and Alsace) immigrants by the order of the Habsburg King Leopold I. Budakeszi was for centuries a predominantly "Schwabian" (ethnic German) village.

After World War II Budakeszi's history was influenced by the deportation of its ethnic German population according to Article 12 of the 1945 Potsdam Agreement.

Budakeszi lost a great number of its citizens due to the above and the vacuum was later filled with the settlement of families from other regions, such as Transylvania.

Near Budakeszi there is an airfield for sailplanes (gliders) and for small planes, as well as a recently established World War 2 German military cemetery.