New Navarre would have included the Pimería Alta, where Kino spent 24 years establishing missions, along with the Navarrese Juan Matheo Manje.

The viceroy supported the idea, and it was approved by Philip V of Spain in 1732, and executed the following year with the appointment of the first governor, Manuel Bernal de Huidobro, at that time mayor of Sinaloa.

By 1806, the province was generally recognized as Sonora or Nueva Navarra, with the capital in Arizpe, and including the area comprising Sinaloa (de Iriarte, 1806).

In the early years of European migration to Nueva Navarra, the Basques became a significant proportion of the population.

The Basque immigrants reached 6% of total migrants in the first 15 years of colonization, the same percentage as those from the Castile or Extremadura, most populated regions.