Located in the center of the Santa Clara Valley on the southern shore of San Francisco Bay, San Jose covers an area of 179.97 sq mi (466.1 km 2).
With a 2022 population of 971,233, it is the most populous city in both the Bay Area and the San Jose–San Francisco–Oakland Combined Statistical Area-which in 2022 had a population of 7.5 million and 9.0 million respectively -the third-most populous city in California after Los Angeles and San Diego, and the 12th-most populous in the United States. San Jose, officially the City of San José ( Spanish for ' Saint Joseph' / ˌ s æ n h oʊ ˈ z eɪ, - ˈ s eɪ/ SAN hoh- ZAY, - SAY Spanish: ), is the largest city in Northern California by both population and area.