876 Area Code – Kingston, Jamaica: Location, Time Zone & History

Area code 876 took effect on May 1, 1997, when Jamaica split away from the Caribbean's shared 809 numbering plan area to become its own numbering plan area within the North American Numbering Plan, following a permissive dialing period that ran through July 31, 1998. As central-office codes filled up, an all-services overlay, 658, was approved and entered service on April 30, 2019, with ten-digit local dialing made mandatory that March; the first 658 numbers weren't actually issued to customers until May 2023.

Kingston, the island's capital and largest city, anchors the numbering plan area alongside Montego Bay, Spanish Town, Portmore, May Pen, Mandeville and Ocho Rios. Jamaica sits on Eastern Time year-round, never observing daylight saving.

• Tourism and hospitality, centered on Montego Bay and the north coast
• Bauxite and alumina mining
• Business process outsourcing and call centers, a leading source of foreign exchange
• Agriculture, including sugar, banana and coffee
• Music and entertainment, rooted in Jamaica's reggae heritage

Jamaica is the birthplace of reggae and of global cultural figures such as Bob Marley, and that heritage remains a major draw for cultural tourism across the 876/658 territory.