McDonaldland was the fictional world that housed characters such as Mayor McCheese and the Hamburglar.
McDonald's developed the setting for advertising in the early 1970s. It gave the company a shared story environment where characters, restaurants, and menu items could appear together in television commercials, packaging, and promotional campaigns.
The name is sometimes confused with individual character names, especially Mayor McCheese or Ronald McDonald. McDonaldland refers to the setting itself, not to one mascot. The world also included characters such as Grimace, Birdie the Early Bird, and Officer Big Mac.
This style of branding was especially prominent when fast-food companies used recurring television characters to build familiarity with children. McDonaldland later became less visible in mainstream advertising, but it remains a distinctive chapter in McDonald's branding history.