Map: California's fastest-growing cities, 2 of them in the Bay Area
Santa Clara and Burlingame are among California’s fastest-growing cities, according to a new report from the state’s Department of Finance.
The list of cities over 30,000 people that had the greatest growth in 2025 is part of several sets of California population data released May 1.
Santa Clara (pop. 138,011) saw its count grow by 2.9% in the year ending Jan. 1, 2026, and Burlingame (32,438) by 2.8%, the report said. They are No. 4 and No. 5 on the growth list, preceded by two cities just east of the Bay Area — Mountain House and Lathrop, both up 5.6% — and Wildomar, in Riverside County.
It was Mountain House’s first full year as a city, having incorporated in July 2024.
Other Bay Area cities that recorded a population change of more than 1% during 2025 are:
- Calistoga, +2.3%
- Mountain View, +1.8%
- Menlo Park, +1.4%
- Sunnyvale, +1.2%
- Atherton, +1.1%
- East Palo Alto, +1.1%
- Suisun City, +1.1%
- Novato, -1.1%
- Yountville, -1.9%
San Jose remained the state’s third most populous city, dropping 0.3% to 980,434 residents. San Francisco (No. 4) gained 0.1%, to 845,658, and Oakland (No. 8) held steady at 429,591.
Overall, the state population declined 0.14 percent, or 54,000 residents, to 39,593,000. Prior to 2025, it saw three consecutive years of increases.
The finance department’s analysts cited federal immigration policy as a major reason for the decline. The report estimated that without the changes that restricted legal international immigration, the state would have added 66,000 residents last year.
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This story was originally published May 5, 2026 at 10:19 AM.