Objective: To compare awareness, treatment and control of hypertension by ethnic groups in a sample of the population included in the Colombia-PURE study. Design and method: Blood pressure was measured twice at home by trained research nurses using an automated device. The average was used. Hypertension (HTN) was defined as a systolic blood pressure (SBP) of 140 mmHg or more and self-reported antihypertensive treatment or previous diagnosis of HTN. The ethnic group was established by the phenotypic characteristics of the participants and they were classified as mestizos, whites, afro-descendant or indigenous. We calculated the prevalence with the respective confidence interval (CI 95%) and differences were established with Chi-squared test. Results: Ethnic group information was obtained from 2601 participants, 71.5% (n = 1867) mestizos, 13.9% (n = 364) whites, 13.7% (n = 357) afro-descendant and 0.9% (n = 24) indigenous. The mean of SBP was 129.2 ± 22.5 mmHg, the highest mean was 135.5 ± 23.2 mmHg in afro-descendants. The total prevalence of HTN was 37.9% (CI 95% 36.0–39.8). The highest prevalence was 44.5% (CI 95% 39.3–49.7) in afro-descendants, followed by 38.5% (CI 95% 33.5–43.5) in whites, 36.6% (CI 95% 34.5–38.8) in mestizos and 29.2% (CI 95% 10.6–47.8) in indigenous. The data was significant (p < 0.05). There was low awareness (36.1%; 0.0%), treatment (35.4%; 14.3%) and control (5.7%; 0.0%) amongst afro-descendants and indigenous, respectively, in comparison to whites (45.3%; 43.2%; 12.2%) and mestizos (49.7%; 44.1%; 16.1%) Conclusions: Afro-descendants and indigenous are considered as a social minority, condition associated with a higher prevalence of HTN and with lower percentages of awareness, treatment and control of hypertension.