[3] Tarapoto is approximately 356 metres (1,168 ft) above sea level on the high jungle plateau, also called the cloud forest.

The region's main activities are tourism, commerce, agriculture, and an illicit "shadow economy" that includes production of coca leaves, lately in decline, extraction of lumber, and trading in land concessions.

Tarapoto is home to the Universidad Nacional de San Martín, an important center of higher education serving the professional and technical needs of a region of high biodiversity.

Moreover, the area's beautiful landscapes, waterfalls and lagoons form a tempting location for adventure tourism, such as river rafting and hiking in the tropical Andes, and attract numerous visitors to the "City of Palms".

The City of Palm Trees, concentrates a large part of the tourist and commercial activity in the region, being the third most sought after and visited city by Peruvians, after Lima and Cusco; It is surrounded to the north by the regional conservation area of the Cordillera Escalera within the South American tropical rainforest and to the south by a fertile valley with crops of rice, corn, coffee, cocoa, tobacco and various agricultural products, with seasonally dry forests.

The city is a nerve center of agricultural products, the surroundings concentrate a wide endemic biodiversity, originating from the last foothills of the eastern Andes, these give rise to an enormous botanical and biological wealth, of an incredible variety of amphibian and bird species.

Currently, the Amazonian metropolis has several hypermarket chains, with all kinds of services, multiplexes, first-class hospitals, high-speed internet, hotel services, luxury resorts, hotels of all categories; The land connection in the mid-1960s brought with it enormous economic and demographic growth to the city, as a result of the construction and paving of access roads, from the capital city, Lima, connecting to the central highway in the central highlands and /or with the Fernando Belaunde Terry highway through Pasco and Huanuco; and in the north interconnected to the cities of Bagua, Chachapoyas, Chiclayo, Piura and Trujillo, and with proximity to the largest port in northern Peru, the port of Paita on the Pacific Ocean and the port of Salaverry in La Libertad, in addition to a connection to Brazil through the river port of Yurimaguas, just 3 hours away by road, and its exit to the Atlantic through the Huallaga River, a tributary of the Marañón River and this of the Amazon River.

The city is located in the valleys of the Cumbaza and Shilcayo rivers, and is the center of the terrestrial networks and areas between the mountains, the coast and eastern Peru.

Tarapoto is considered the gastronomic capital of the Peruvian Amazon, its enormous variety of typical dishes is the result of the intense miscegenation between the native indigenous cultures of the Amazon, European immigration, Japanese and Chinese immigration (the latter brought rice at the end of the century XIX and at the beginning of the XX century, intensifying its cultivation in the agricultural zone of the city), for which Tarapoto is the cradle of the Amazon gastronomy of Peru for being much older than the cities of Iquitos and Pucallpa, in the city you can enjoy the most varied typical foods of the jungle.

Its shrimps are famous, those that are enjoyed in the ninajuanes; the well-known juane, made from rice, eggs, olives and chicken meat, wrapped in bijao leaves, as well as the exquisite chorizo and cecina that have been industrialized and are currently exported to large supermarkets throughout the country.

Traditional food: The animal rescue Centre Urku,[11] the spa of Cumbaza, the archaeological remains of the petroglyphs of Polish (Bello Horizonte)[1], abundant plant and animal life, the waterfalls of: It is close to the largest lake of incredible beauty called Sauce or Laguna Azul (Blue Lagoon) Visitors can enjoy a landscape blessed with a wide variety of flora and fauna, numerous waterfalls and opportunities for adventure tourism (such as white water rafting on the Mayo River, abseiling, jungle expeditions and treks).

The Regional Museum of the National University of San Martin has a notable anthropology section, which includes both ethnographic and archaeological collections from Peruvian Amazonia.