The two fastest growing cities in the Bay Area in 2024 were both in San Mateo County. Belmont grew by 3.9%, with the city of just over 25,000 growing by over 1,000 residents last year, according to new estimates from the California Department of Finance. Burlingame, just up the Peninsula, saw the next biggest increase, growing by 2.6% to 31,500 residents.
Across the bay, Berkeley is the largest East Bay city to show significant growth, with nearly 1,700 additional residents, an increase of 1.3%. The rest of the cities with growth over 1% were Oakley, in Contra Costa County, Dublin and Newark in Alameda County, and Gilroy in Santa Clara County.
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San Jose, the region’s most populous city, fell out of the ranks of million-resident cities a few years ago, and saw a small drop again last year of 0.08%, with an estimated 979,415 residents on Jan. 1 2025. San Francisco, the next largest city, also saw a drop, but more dramatic. The city lost 0.39% of its residents, going from 845,000 to 842,000 residents.
While the region overall saw a slight 0.04% increase in population, about 2,500 more residents, the majority of the region’s 69 cities saw a drop in population from Jan. 1 2024 to Jan. 1 2025. According to the updated estimates, the state and region’s growth slowed from the year before.
Around the region, 40 cities saw a drop in population. The most dramatic decline was in Moraga, which lost nearly 2% of its population last year and has an estimated 16,600 residents this year.