The Quinceañera is a young Latina woman's celebration of her fifteenth birthday, which is celebrated in a specific and different way from her other birthdays. The word is also used to refer to the young woman whose 15th birthday is being celebrated (analogous to the word "cumpleañera" for "birthday girl"). The closest equivalent to the Quinceañera in the English-speaking world is the Sweet Sixteen.

The celebration begins with a Thanksgiving Mass (Misa de Accion de Gracias), in which the quinceañera arrives in formal dress, accompanied by her parents, godparents (padrinos), seven maids of honor (damas) and seven chamberlains. After the Mass, the younger sisters, female cousins and friends of the quinceañera pass out party favors, and the quinceañera leaves her bouquet in an altar to the Virgin Mary. The Mass is followed by a party at either the quinceañera's home or in a banquet hall leased for the occasion. At the party, the quinceañera dances a special dance with her father and male relatives, then her boyfriend, or male friend dances the remaining part of the dance with the birthday girl.

In Cuba it may include of a choreographed group dance, usually 16 couples dancing waltz around the fifteenth birthday girl who was led by one of the top dancers of her choice or her boy friend. Sometimes the choreography included four or six other skilled dancers called Escortas (escorts). They were allowed (outside the choreography) to dance around the fifteenth-birthday girl, Quinceañera. They were usually dancers with good experience and were improvisors who did moves to make the central couple outstand for the expectators. They were also allowed to dress with different color tuxedos.

Fifteenth celebrations were very popular until late 1970s. The custom entered Cuba via Spain, but its major influence was French. Wealthy families, who could afford luxurious halls and the hiring of a notorious choreographer, were the actual pioneers of Quinceañeras. Although lower-income families could not afford the same display of wealth, they, too, started to celebrate Quinceañeras and called Quinces. Those celebrations usually took place at the very home of the birthday girl or at a relative’s whose home was more spacious.

‘’’How it expanded in the Cuban society’’’.

As wealthy families celebrated this event at luxurious ballrooms, lower-income individuals, specially the young, would watch through the colonial-barred windows and enjoy it from the outside. Some servants and other employees to the wealthy families, who were involved in the caterings, were probably the first to import the custom into the rest of the population.

Some times the entire family would save through the years for this important event. The fifteenth birthday celebration acquired such as a relevant importance in the live of a young girl that a popular saying was: ‘’’there are two most important things for a woman: her fifteenth and her wedding’’’. Luis Carbonell , nationally well-acclaimed figure who transmitted the average Cuban way of life, expressed this cultural custom through his ‘’’Los quince de Florita’’’ .