Question

What is the hybridization of benzene?

Answer 1

Assuming you mean carbon atom...

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...then it is `sp^2`, noting that hybridization applies only to the sigma/`sigma` bonds and NOT the pi/`pi` bonds. `sp^2` hybridization is gone into more detail here.

Benzene is a planar aromatic ring, and has many representations:

Regardless of whether we draw the Kekulé structure or the delocalized representation, the structure is a ring containing carbon atoms that each had formed their first bond in three directions.

It's just like compounds such as `"BF"_3` and `"AlCl"_3`.

The first bond made by an atom is preferentially a `sigma` bond, and if an atom has three bonding directions with no lone pairs of electrons, as in benzene, that atom can be said to utilize `bb(sp^2)` hybridization (regardless of how the `pi` interactions are represented).