East Palo Alto is a city located in San Mateo County, California, within the United States. Situated on the San Francisco Peninsula, it lies approximately halfway between the cities of San Francisco and San Jose. The city is bordered by the San Francisco Bay to the north and east, Menlo Park to the west, and Palo Alto to the south.
Originally established as an unincorporated community, East Palo Alto was officially incorporated in July 1983. It shares telephone area codes and postal ZIP codes with its neighbor, Palo Alto, which is separated from it primarily by San Francisquito Creek and the Bayshore Freeway. As of the 2020 census, the city had a population of 30,034.
In recent years, the city has undergone revitalization projects characterized by the influx of high-income, high-tech professionals, including employees from companies such as Google and Facebook. These developments have begun to gradually reduce the historical cultural and economic disparities between East Palo Alto and the neighboring city of Palo Alto.