US Map / Cities / San Diego

San Diego Map

The southwestern corner of the contiguous United States belongs to San Diego, a city of about 1.40 million in 2024 built on mesas above a deep natural bay.

Where is San Diego?

San Diego occupies the extreme southwest of California, with the Mexican border a few miles south of downtown and Tijuana immediately across it. The city runs about 20 miles up the coast and inland over a series of flat-topped mesas cut by steep canyons. It is roughly 120 miles southeast of Los Angeles, about 355 miles west of Phoenix, and some 500 road miles south of San Francisco.

San Diego at a glance

No. 8 on the 2024 list is a margin of 122,204 people: that is how far San Diego trails San Antonio, while Dallas is 78,365 further back. Within California it comes second of fifteen, behind Los Angeles. Against California's 39.43 million residents, though, that is only about 3.6%. It holds about 43% of San Diego County's 3,298,799 residents.

San Diego in California

San Diego County stretches from the ocean to the desert and contains the city plus Chula Vista to its south; both are listed on the California county map. Northward, the built-up coast continues through Orange County to Santa Ana, Anaheim and Long Beach. The California state page covers the whole 800-mile length of the state.

The bay, the mesas and the border

San Diego Bay is a deep, sheltered harbor protected by the long sand spit of Coronado and the headland of Point Loma — one of the few natural deep-water harbors on the Pacific coast south of San Francisco, and the reason the US Navy is so heavily concentrated here. Inland, the terrain rises in steps: coastal mesas, then the Peninsular Ranges, then a sharp drop into the Colorado Desert. The Tijuana River is one of the few streams in North America that flows north across the international border before reaching the sea.

Cities near San Diego

Up the coast are Chula Vista, Santa Ana, Anaheim, Long Beach and Los Angeles. Compare them all on the US map with cities.