Numerous indigenous cultures inhabited what is now Ecuadorian territory for several millennia before the expansion of the Inca Empire in the fifteenth century.

According to Kluck, writing in 1989, ethnic groups in Ecuador have had a traditional hierarchy of European Ecuadorian, Mestizo, Afro-Ecuadorians, and then others.

Spanish-born persons residing in the New World (peninsulares) were at the top of the social hierarchy, followed by criollos, born of two Spanish parents in the colonies.

The vocabulary that more prosperous Mestizos and European Ecuadorians used in describing ethnic groups mixes social and biological characteristics.

Ethnic identity reflects numerous characteristics, only one of which is physical appearance; others include dress, language, community membership, and self-identification.

Pressure on Sierra land resources and the dissolution of the traditional hacienda, however, increased the numbers of Indigenous peoples migrating to the Costa, the Oriente, and the cities.

Prolonged contact with Hispanic culture, which dates back to the conquest, has had a homogenizing effect, reducing the variation among the indigenous Sierra tribes.

Visible markers of ethnic affiliation, especially hairstyle, dress, and language, separate Indigenous Ecuadorians from the rest of the populace.

Indigenous Ecuadorians wore more manufactured items by the late 1970s than previously; their clothing, nonetheless, was distinct from that of other rural inhabitants.

Traditionally, both groups relied on migration to resolve intracommunity conflict and to limit the ecological damage to the tropical forest caused by slash-and-burn agriculture.

Their mode of horticulture was similar to that of the non-Christian Yumbo people, although they supplemented crop production with hunting and some livestock raising.

The destruction of their crops by Mestizos laying claim to indigenous lands, the rapid exposure to diseases to which Indians lacked immunity, and the extreme social disorganization all contributed to increased mortality and decreased birth rates.

One study of the Shuar people in the 1950s found that the group between ten and nineteen years of age was smaller than expected.

[35] There is a small number of Eastern Orthodox Christians, indigenous religions, Muslims (see Islam in Ecuador), Buddhists and Baháʼís.

There are also different kinds of traditional music like albazo, pasacalle, fox incaico, tonada, capishca, Bomba highly established in afro-Ecuadorian society like Esmeraldas, and so on.

According to the Ecuadorian musicologist Segundo Luis Moreno, Sanjuanito was danced by Indigenous people during San Juan Bautista's birthday.

Most regions in Ecuador follow the traditional three course meal of soup, a second course which includes rice and a protein such as meat or fish, and then dessert and coffee to finish.

In the highland region, pork, chicken, beef, and cuy (guinea pig) are popular and are served with a variety of grains (especially rice and corn) or potatoes.

Arroz con menestra y carne asada (rice with beans and grilled beef) is one of the traditional dishes of Guayaquil, as is fried plantain which is often served with it.

This region is a leading producer of bananas, cacao beans (to make chocolate), shrimp, tilapia, mangos and passion fruit, among other products.

One of the earliest examples is Jacinto Collahuazo,[46] an indigenous chief of a northern village in today's Ibarra, born in the late 1600s.

Despite the early repression and discrimination of the native people by the Spanish, Collahuazo learned to read and write in Castilian, but his work was written in Quechua.

The use of the Quipu was banned by the Spanish,[47] and in order to preserve their work, many Inca poets had to resort to the use of the Latin alphabet to write in their native Quechua language.

The history behind the Inca drama "Ollantay", the oldest literary piece in existence for any indigenous language in America,[48] shares some similarities with the work of Collahuazo.

The existence of his literary work came to light many centuries later, when a crew of masons was restoring the walls of a colonial church in Quito, and found a hidden manuscript.

De Velasco wrote about the nations and chiefdoms that had existed in the Kingdom of Quito (today Ecuador) before the arrival of the Spanish.

Famous authors from the late colonial and early republic period include: Eugenio Espejo a printer and main author of the first newspaper in Ecuadorian colonial times; Jose Joaquin de Olmedo (born in Guayaquil), famous for his ode to Simón Bolívar titled La Victoria de Junin; Juan Montalvo, a prominent essayist and novelist; Juan Leon Mera, famous for his work "Cumanda" or "Tragedy among Savages" and the Ecuadorian National Anthem; Luis A. Martínez with A la Costa, Dolores Veintimilla,[49] and others.

The best known art styles from Ecuador belonged to the Escuela Quiteña, which developed from the 16th to 18th centuries, examples of which are on display in various old churches in Quito.

Ecuadorian painters include: Eduardo Kingman, Oswaldo Guayasamín and Camilo Egas from the Indiginist Movement; Manuel Rendón, Jaime Zapata, Enrique Tábara, Aníbal Villacís, Theo Constante, León Ricaurte and Estuardo Maldonado from the Informalist Movement; and Luis Burgos Flor with his abstract, Futuristic style.

[50] Cyclist Richard Carapaz, the winner of 2019 Giro d'Italia, won a gold medal at the road cycling race of the 2020 Summer Olympics.