Arthur Bremer sold his hotel for use to British Colonial authorities who had administered Swaziland since 1894 as their national administrative headquarters, and stipulated that the settlement would bear his name (dorp is the Afrikaans word for "village").

However, Bremersdorp subsequently remained the commercial, agricultural, and transportation heart of Swaziland, earning the town the nickname "The Hub."

Since its inception in the 1920s, the Agricultural and Mechanical Show (name later changed to the Swaziland International Trade Fair) has been the country's largest and best-attended annual event.

At the western terminus of the city on the highway to Mbabane is KaKhoza Township, a poor neighborhood with the appearance of an informal settlement.

The popularity of Fairview Township prompted the expansion of the area north of a hill occupied at its summit by St. Paul's Methodist Church and School, beside a landmark water tower.

Extension 6 north of Coates Valley is predominantly middle-class homes and abuts a planned community of up-market properties, Madonsa Township.

Manzini has pockets of extreme poverty: informal settlements along the river, east of Coates Valley, and west between KaKhoza Township and the industrial town Matsapha.

[3] Manzini has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen: Cwa) with hot, rainy summers and mild, dry winters.