The mammalian cerebral cortex is anatomically organized into a six-layer motif. It is currently unknown whether a corresponding laminar motif of neuronal activity patterns exists across the cortex. Here we report such a motif in the power of local field potentials (LFPs). Using laminar probes, we recorded LFPs from 14 cortical areas across the cortical hierarchy in five macaque monkeys. The laminar locations of recordings were histologically identified by electrolytic lesions. Across all areas, we found a ubiquitous spectrolaminar pattern characterized by an increasing deep-to-superficial layer gradient of high-frequency power peaking in layers 2/3 and an increasing superficial-to-deep gradient of alpha-beta power peaking in layers 5/6. Laminar recordings from additional species showed that the spectrolaminar pattern is highly preserved among primates-macaque, marmoset and human-but more dissimilar in mouse. Our results suggest the existence of a canonical layer-based and frequency-based mechanism for cortical computation.