Naga (officially the City of Naga; Central Bikol: Ciudad nin Naga; Rinconada Bikol: Ciudad ka Naga; ; ; or the Pilgrim City of Naga) is an independent component city in the Bicol Region of the Philippines. According to the , it has a population of people. It is the most populous city in Camarines Sur and the smallest city in Bicol by land area.
The town was established in 1575 by order of Spanish Governor-General Francisco de Sande. The city, then named Nueva Cáceres (New Cáceres), was one of the Spanish royal cities in the Spanish East Indies, along with Manila, Cebu City, and Iloilo City, historically, the third oldest.
Geographically and statistically classified, as well as legislatively represented within Camarines Sur, but administratively independent of the provincial government, Naga is considered to be the Bicol Region's trade, business, medical, educational, and financial center. On 27 May 2026, Naga was declared a highly urbanized city by President Marcos Jr. pending a plebiscite per the Local Government Code of 1991.
Naga is known as the "Queen City of Bicol" due to the historical significance of Naga in the Bicol Region; as the "Heart of Bicol", due to its central geographical location on the Bicol Peninsula; and as "Pilgrim City," since Naga is also home to one of the largest Marian pilgrimages in Asia to the shrine of Our Lady of Peñafrancia, an image that is one of the country's most popular objects of devotion. Naga is described as "One of the Seven Golden Cities of the Sun" by Nick Joaquín.
It is one of the two cities in the Philippines named Naga, the other being in Cebu.
Etymology
thumb|upright|left|[[Lignum nephriticum cup made of narra wood (the namesake of the province) produced opalescent colors when water is poured into it. These wooden cups were a major pre-colonial and colonial industry of Naga.]]
Naga is the native pre-colonial name of the city. It is named after the narra tree (Pterocarpus indicus), which is known as naga in the Bicol language. It was abundant in the region and was part of a pre-colonial industry of wooden cups and bowls made from narra that produced distinctive blue and yellow opalescent colors when water is poured into them (later known to Europeans as lignum nephriticum). During the Spanish colonial era, they were exported to Mexico as luxury goods for their purported diuretic properties via the Manila-Acapulco Galleons, and from there, to Europe. They were often presented as gifts to European nobility.
The Jesuit missionary and historian Juan José Delgado (1697–1755) describes the industry in the following: