She was born Máxima Zorreguieta in Buenos Aires, Argentina, on 17 May 1971. Máxima is the daughter of Jorge Horacio Zorreguieta Stefanini, a farmer and a politician (died 2017). He was the under-secretary of Agriculture under Jorge R. Videla's military dictatorship. She studied in Northlands School, in Argentina. She has two brothers, a sister and three half-sisters by her father's first wife.