Puerto Ricans are predominately a tri-racial, Spanish-speaking, Christian society, descending in varying degrees from Indigenous Taíno natives, Southwestern European colonists, and West and Central African slaves, freedmen, and free Blacks.

Puerto Rico has also received immigration from other parts of Spain such as Catalonia as well as from other European countries such as France, Ireland, Italy and Germany.

Also present in today's Puerto Ricans are traces (about 10-15%) of the aboriginal Taíno natives that inhabited the island at the time European colonizers arrived in 1493.

[15][16] Recent studies in population genetics have concluded that Puerto Rican gene pool is on average predominantly European, with a significant Sub-Saharan African, North African Guanche, and Indigenous American substrate, the latter two originating in the aboriginal people of the Canary Islands and Puerto Rico's pre-Columbian Taíno inhabitants, respectively.

Many of the French escaped to Puerto Rico via what is now the Dominican Republic and settled in the west coast of the island, especially in Mayagüez.

[32] Many Spaniard men took Taino and West African wives and in the first centuries of the Spanish colonial period the island was overwhelmingly racially mixed.

"[33] Under Spanish rule, mass immigration shifted the ethnic make-up of the island, as a result of the Royal Decree of Graces of 1815.

[45][46][47] The majority of the European ancestry in Puerto Ricans comes from southern Spain, more specifically the Canary Islands, this is also true for many Dominicans and Cubans.

Canarians are of partial Guanche ancestry, a North African Berber ethnic group who were the original inhabitants before Spanish conquest.

This means that by extension, many Puerto Ricans have minuscule amounts of North African blood through the indigenous Guanches of the Canary Islands.

[48][49] In the 1899 census, taken the year Spain ceded Puerto Rico to the United States following its invasion and annexation in the Spanish–American War, 61.8% of the people were identified as White.

[52][34][53][54][55][56] The European ancestry of Puerto Ricans comes primarily from one source: Spaniards (including Canarians, Catalans, Castilians, Galicians, Asturians, Andalusians, and Basques).

The Canarian cultural influence in Puerto Rico is one of the most important components in which many villages were founded from these immigrants, which started from 1493 to 1890 and beyond.

Many Spaniards, especially Canarians, chose Puerto Rico because of its Hispanic ties and relative proximity in comparison with other former Spanish colonies.

This began as a temporary exile which became a permanent relocation and the last significant wave of Spanish or European migration to Puerto Rico.

[57][58] Other sources of European populations are Corsicans, French, Italians, Portuguese (especially Azoreans), Greeks, Germans, Irish, Scots, Maltese, Dutch, English, and Danes.

[60][46][47][44] Puerto Rico's self-identified indigenous population therefore consist mostly of indigenous-identified persons (oftentimes with predominant Indigenous ancestry, but not always) from within the genetically mestizo population of mixed European and Amerindian ancestry, even when most other Puerto Ricans of their exact same mixture would identify either as mixed-race or even as white.

According to the National Geographic Genographic Project, "the average Puerto Rican individual carries 12% Native American, 65% West Eurasian (Mediterranean, Northern European and/or Middle Eastern) and 20% Sub-Saharan African DNA.

"[65] In genetic terms, even many of those of pure Spanish origin would have North and, in some cases, West African ancestry brought from founder populations, particularly in the Canary Islands.

This diversity can be seen in the everyday lifestyle of many Puerto Ricans such as the profound Latin, African, and Taíno influences regarding food, music, dance, and architecture.

In the early days of US rule, from 1900 to the 1940s, the Puerto Rican economy was small and undeveloped, it relied heavily on agriculture.

[76] Large concentrations can be found in the Northeast region and in Florida, in the metropolitan areas of New York, Orlando, Philadelphia, Miami, Chicago, Tampa, and Boston, among others.

Puerto Rican populations in other countries are very small, not large enough to have dominance over certain neighborhoods and cities like in Florida and the US Northeast.

Home to a sizeable deaf community, the actual numbers are unknown due to unavailable source data.

The Spanish of Puerto Rico also includes occasional Taíno words, typically in the context of vegetation, natural phenomena or primitive musical instruments.

Similarly, words attributed to primarily West African languages were adopted in the contexts of foods, music or dances.

Pollster Pablo Ramos wrote that the population was 38% Roman Catholic, 28% Pentecostal, and 18% were members of independent churches.

[109][110][109] Most recently, in a June 2016 report, the Special Committee called for the United States to expedite the process to allow self-determination in Puerto Rico.

More specifically, the group called on the United States to expedite a process that would allow the people of Puerto Rico to exercise fully their right to self-determination and independence.

... allow the Puerto Rican people to take decisions in a sovereign manner, and to address their urgent economic and social needs, including unemployment, marginalization, insolvency and poverty".