SFO

$40 Find Cheap Flights from California to San Francisco

This is the cheapest one-way flight price found by a KAYAK user in the last 72 hours by searching for a flight to San Francisco departing on 9/13. Fares are subject to change and may not be available on all flights or dates of travel. Click the price to replicate the search for this deal.
1 adult
1 adult, Economy

KAYAK searches hundreds of travel sites at once for deals on flights to San Francisco

Travelers love KAYAK
41,299,237 searches in the past 7 days on KAYAK

Save 22% or moreCompare multiple travel sites with one search.

Track pricesNot ready to book? Create a price alert for when prices drop.

Bundle and saveSave money when you bundle your flight + hotel.

Filter your dealsChoose cabin class, free Wi-Fi and more.

Flight Deals
Useful Info
Flight Deals

Cheap Flights from California to San Francisco

 
Here are some of the best deals found on KAYAK recently from the most popular airlines for round-trip flights from California to San Francisco that are departing in the next months. While these flights were available on KAYAK in the last 72 hours, prices and availability are subject to change and deals may expire.
Discover the best prices for you by selecting your travel dates on KAYAK.

Recent round-trip flight deals from California to San Francisco

Thu, Sep 25 - Sun, Sep 28
Frontier Logo
7:30 pm - 9:21 pmLAS-SFO
1h 51mnonstop
Frontier Logo
5:37 pm - 7:21 pmSFO-LAS
1h 44mnonstop
$67Frontier
Find Deal
Sat, Sep 13 - Tue, Sep 16
Frontier Logo
11:26 am - 1:15 pmLAS-SFO
1h 49mnonstop
Frontier Logo
8:00 am - 9:47 amSFO-LAS
1h 47mnonstop
$68Frontier
Find Deal
Thu, Sep 25 - Sun, Sep 28
Southwest Logo
8:50 pm - 10:25 pmSAN-SFO
1h 35mnonstop
Southwest Logo
6:50 am - 8:20 amSFO-SAN
1h 30mnonstop
$77Southwest
Find Deal
Thu, Oct 2 - Thu, Oct 2
Southwest Logo
8:05 am - 9:50 amSAN-SFO
1h 45mnonstop
Southwest Logo
4:50 pm - 11:05 pmSFO-SAN
6h 15m1 stop
$89Southwest
Find Deal
Sat, Oct 11 - Sun, Oct 12
United Airlines Logo
7:28 pm - 9:08 pmSAN-SFO
1h 40mnonstop
United Airlines Logo
6:15 am - 7:56 amSFO-SAN
1h 41mnonstop
$96United Airlines
Find Deal
Thu, Oct 2 - Mon, Oct 6
United Airlines Logo
3:44 pm - 4:55 pmSBA-SFO
1h 11mnonstop
United Airlines Logo
10:35 pm - 11:49 pmSFO-SBA
1h 14mnonstop
$97United Airlines
Find Deal
Wed, Sep 24 - Mon, Sep 29
Alaska Airlines Logo
3:06 pm - 9:32 pmSAN-SFO
6h 26m1 stop
Alaska Airlines Logo
7:10 am - 8:52 amSFO-SAN
1h 42mnonstop
$107Alaska Airlines
Find Deal
Sat, Sep 27 - Mon, Sep 29
Delta Logo
8:35 am - 9:58 amLAX-SFO
1h 23mnonstop
Delta Logo
5:55 am - 7:23 amSFO-LAX
1h 28mnonstop
$107Delta
Find Deal
Wed, Nov 19 - Sun, Nov 23
Alaska Airlines Logo
8:08 pm - 10:01 pmSAN-SFO
1h 53mnonstop
Alaska Airlines Logo
7:00 am - 8:39 amSFO-SAN
1h 39mnonstop
$112Alaska Airlines
Find Deal
Tue, Dec 2 - Sat, Dec 6
Delta Logo
6:55 pm - 8:21 pmLAX-SFO
1h 26mnonstop
Delta Logo
4:15 pm - 5:45 pmSFO-LAX
1h 30mnonstop
$112Delta
Find Deal
Useful Info

Good to know

Low seasonJanuary
Cheapest flight$40
Best time to beat the crowds with an average 11% drop in price.
Most popular time to fly with an average 12% increase in price.
Flight from San Diego to San Francisco

Flights from California to San Francisco: the best tips from KAYAK users

Insights shared by verified travelers who flew the route from California to San Francisco 
JakeFlew with United AirlinesBIH-SFOJul 2025
Security in Bishop does not open until 1 hour before the flight.
RonaldFlew with Alaska AirlinesSNA-SFOApr 2025
The airport security can take a long time, the bathrooms are not always available near the gates due to construction, repairs, remodels.
Verified travelerFlew with Alaska AirlinesLAX-SFOJan 2025
Bring water and snacks with shorter flights as some routes will not offer it.
CongFlew with United AirlinesSNA-SFONov 2024
Nothing really, being clothes that are easily taken off like shoes at the security will always save time
VyomaFlew with Alaska AirlinesSAN-SFOJun 2024
Be sure to read the signs, i have heard it's confusing for connecting flights if you don't follow the directions.
Verified travelerFlew with Alaska AirlinesLAX-SFOJul 2024
Bring a sweater, just incase other people's ac makes you cool.
Verified travelerFlew with Alaska AirlinesSNA-SFOFeb 2024
Long Beach and SNA are convenient airports for flying out of Orange County. I wish I knew about the size of the plane which caused a fee for checking one small bag that normally was a carry on for other airlines such as SouthWest.

FAQs for booking flights from California to San Francisco

  • How does KAYAK find such low prices on flights from California to San Francisco?

    KAYAK is a travel search engine. That means we look across the web to find the best prices we can find for our users. With over 2 billion flight queries processed yearly, we are able to display a variety of prices and options on flights from California to San Francisco.

  • How does KAYAK's flight Price Forecast tool help me choose the right time to buy my flight ticket from California to San Francisco?

    KAYAK’s flight Price Forecast tool uses historical data to determine whether the price for a flight to San Francisco from California is likely to change within 7 days, so travelers know whether to wait or book now.

  • What is the Hacker Fare option on flights from California to San Francisco?

    Hacker Fares allow you to combine one-way tickets in order to save you money over a traditional round-trip ticket. You could then fly to San Francisco with an airline and back to California with another airline.

  • What is KAYAK's "flexible dates" feature and why should I care when looking for a flight from California to San Francisco?

    Sometimes travel dates aren't set in stone. If your preferred travel dates have some wiggle room, flexible dates will show you all the options when flying to San Francisco from California up to 3 days before/after your preferred dates. You can then pick the flights that suit you best.

Reviews of the top 5 airlines serving from California to San Francisco

 
Need help choosing which airline to fly with from California to San Francisco? KAYAK airline reviews give an overall score for each airline based on loads of factors, including comfort, boarding, in-flight entertainment and more, to make your decision easier. See airline scores according to verified KAYAK customer reviews.
8.0
Alaska AirlinesOverall score based on 10000 reviews
8.5Crew
8.1Boarding
7.0Entertainment
7.8Comfort
7.1Food
Airline reviews

Miss bigger screens for movies Staff was friendly Seats comfortable Bathroom line long

8.0 ExcellentAnonymous, Aug 2025JFK - SFO
Read more Alaska Airlines reviews

Miss bigger screens for movies Staff was friendly Seats comfortable Bathroom line long

Seats are so small now that it's very hard even for a medium-sized person to be comfortable!!!

My experience would’ve been great because we were on a new plane, but they said as we boarded that the plane would be too new to have WiFi, which to me is unreasonable - newer planes should def have WiFi! It was a 5 hour flight from Anchorage to San Fran and because there was no WiFi, I had to take an unexpected half day off work, which was super annoying because I had a lot to do and we only found out a few minutes before takeoff.

I liked the crew. There was no food flight to short

2 FLIGHT DELAYS? what an inconvenience to stay @the airport HALF THE DAY😳from 1pm till boarding @ 4pm pass 😠exhausting !

Flight was delayed - we left at 11:30 pm instead of 10:30 and it was extremely inconvenient. It affected both the day of the flight and the next day

I don’t like it stuff not friendly and no one help for my mom she 82 years old lady I requested wheel chair but no one provided and no one help.

If there were movies it would have made the flight much easier.

I loved that the checking in process was seamlessly easy and user friendly. The crew was very nice and professional. Unfortunately, we were seated in the back of the plane across from the bathroom. There wasn’t much room for leg room and comfortability. Alongside, we had to listen to a baby crying up and down the aisle way for the entire plane ride. The turbulence of the plane landing was rocky. Overall, the experience with Alaska was just okay. We made it home alive so that’s always a positive.

would have been nice for flight to not be delayed by 2 hours so that we had to pay $80 to get home since BART had shut down. i thought a 10pm arrival would leave enough time to account for delays but i was wrong.

Very smooth checking in our luggage with a super pleasant SW agent. I enjoyed a fun entertaining movie.

First time traveling on Southwest since bag fees were implemented. Usual good service. Just more expensive now.

It was a perfect flight in all aspects! Both legs!

Boarding process, crew were good. But the seats were so uncomfortable that was all I could focus on. I literally had to sit forward so that all 3 of us could fit in row. I will try to avoid Southwest in the future for any flights over 60 minutes.

Great flight, 47 passengers on a 180 seat plane. Stewardess was pleasant and cheerful.

Great experience flying Southwest. The crew was really kind and helpful, and very friendly with our toddler.

Plane late from DC to Austin 30 minutes. Crew made up much of the time enroute to San Diego.

Fine, but how to board on SW versus othrr airlines, is just lame. Goood staff though and all was solid otherwise.

Was as expected. Crowed planes. Too many carryons delaying takeoff. But the ride only took an hour and saved me a lot of time SFO is a not a great airport.

I will be flying again Southwest Airlines. Friendly crew, comfortable and affordable.

I was uncomfortably cold on the plane. Other than that it was uneventful and therefore as enjoyable as a plane ride can be.

Food was surprisingly good but the WiFi was not great

My husband upgraded our seats and I don't know if it was due to the type of planet was or if they didn't upgrade our seats. We were supposed to be in I believe comfort seats and they were just as tight as any other seat- no leg room and we are very tall people but at least it wasn't extremely cold. My husband did put in a complaint about our seating because he paid extra and if we would have known that the space and the tightness would have been the same, we just would have gotten the emergency row emergency row seats that we normally get. We love Delta but both our flights coming home we're not good. Oh I forgot to mention that on our flight to Hawaii our luggage wheels got broke and we had to purse new luggage on vacation then we never had this problem so we didn't know protocol and reported it after we got home only for them to tell is we only had 24hrs to report the damage. Not sure what was going on with Delta this vacation trip.

My flight was extremely cold. I had a jacket and a cover was left in each seat. The cover was extremely thin and I have a disability, fibromyalgia and arthrithis and AC air is the worst. I closed my vent and my husbands vent and it still was frigid. I asked the attendant if I could get another cover and she quickly almost dismissively and totally unconcerned stating, (I quote) (one per chair) and walked off so quickly that I didn't get a chance to explain to her that I literally have adisability. I didnt want to make a seen so I set on that flight for over 5 hours in pain, joints locking up and extremely uncomfortable. When my fibromyalgia flares up my joints not only ache but they will lock up also and it takes me days to get back to my regular self even though I take medication for it. I felt like it would not have hurt anyone at all for her to just give me an extra cover because I'm sure they have all types of medical issues in people that fly every day.

Crew was excellent. Comfort seats not as nice as other kinds of planes.

Not a "Delta" issue, but a JFK issue: We booked a connecting flight with 3 1/2 hours between to clearn immigration and customs. Our inbound flight (BCN to JFK) was on the taxiway 45 minutes which ate into our layover time. Immigtration was insanely quick with the CBP MPC app; however, clearing TSA (again, after we were ALREADY cleared in Spain on the inbound international flight) took over 95 minutes. This left us with 10 minutes before boarding the connecting flight (JFK to SAN) to walk to the far end of Terminal 4 and try to find food. We didn't find any food that could promise to serve us in under 10 minutes so we boarded the Delta flight after coming off a plance and an 8-hour flight knowing that we wouldn't be served any food on the next 5 1/2 hour flight. I feel like Delta needs to put pressure on the JFK TSA to open more screening stations (by our count, we saw only 5 scanners open and a line of - as we said - over 90 minutes. The insult is that we WERE ALREADY SCREENED through TSA, but as you come off one flight into the USA, you have to go through the whole process again. It seems like if you have a connecting flight, there should be a way to pass through immigration and customs without needing to return through TSA.

There are 4 flights in consecutive gates with about the same departure time. Two flights were boarding at the same time. One was delayed or boarding would be happening at the same time. I am not sure what Delta and LAX need to do to have a better layout at the end of Terminal 2

5 hours of delay that could've been much shorter if Delta had taken the 1 hour delay they imposed on the flight before boarding to run any of the plane checks required for flight to find the hydraulic issue that required nearly 3 hours to fix. $24 of meal credit buys a sandwich and a soft drink. Poor communication within the terminal about what gate we'd be re-boarding from and when we'd be re-boarding.

The entertainment and wifi mostly didn't work on this flight.

Terrible entertainment system - kept freezing and audio kept cutting out. Snacks were mediocre at best for a 5 hour flight.

1. when we went to check in, our 2 first class seats had been CANCELED and the flight was sold out. This was done without our prior knowledge. It was all we could do to restore one first class seat for my wife and I flew economy. 2, Our flight home was scheduled to leave at 10:30 pm. Due to tsunami warnings, the roads were closed and our flight status was uncertain as to whether it would leave as scheduled. It was announced that it would now leave at 11:20 pm and the roads were now open since the tsunami had come and gone. We made a mad dash to the airport and checked in. Delays were announced at 12:30 pm, 1:30 am, 2:30 am and at 3:30 am it was canceled. Since this was a flight due to natural (tsunami) causes, there was no compensation. We were told to return at 1:00 pm the next day and our baggage would be kept on the plane since the same plane was going to leave at 1:00 pm. We had to return to our hotel for the rest of the night. The same plane did not leave at 1:00 pm and our baggage was gone! All in all, it was a miserable performance by UA. Information was hard to obtain and no one knew what was going on and what was going to happen. Hundreds of passengers slept on the floor, chairs, etc. No food and no water was made available to the passengers. It was a situation where UA could care less what was going on. As a one million mile flyer, I had not experienced anything like this before and it was hugely disappointing!

Boarded plane and then delayed 1.5 hours while on the plane

My flight was delayed a very short period of time but they did not hold my connecting flight to San Diego, also through United. So they closed the doors before we got off our plane. They would only have to help the door open for another five to ten minutes. So I missed a court deadline for a manditory mediation settlement conference for my client. I had to get an associate to be there in person and be on the phone with him relaying what he needs to do the entire time. The court was very upset with me and so was my client. United cannot be trusted.

Really good 😊 the woman at the gate entrance was a little rude checking in our carry-on but i dont think she worked for the airline, she worked for the airport at sacramento, other than that amazing.

Boarding was mayhem. Late boarding by 15 minutes because of lack of staff (missing 1 flight attendant. We had to wait for an arrival of another plane before we could board). Flight was a little rough, but cannot blame on airlines.

United out of SFO is having issues with catering so none of our meals were loaded on the plane and no offer of compensation for our tickets purchased was offered.

A bit rush for transit. Food and entertainment are not available

The gate was too far away for the connecting flight

Generally good. The aisles have gotten narrower which can slow down boarding. Flight crew was great! Healthier complimentary snacks would be appreciated. Due to earthquake in San Francisco we had to circle in air space for a bit but then had a smooth landing. I laud the flight crew for their patience ;)

The agents was very rude and they charged me $50 for a carry-on bag saying that it was too big and then I saw someone going on a plane with the same size bag as me

Great for the price. No wifi or entertainment, but gate agents and crew were fantastic and we boarded quickly and left on time.

Decent clean onboard experience. Okay discount airline experience. Unfortunately, any customer service interactions are difficult and unhelpful. There is no service. Also, a premium seat only gets you premium boarding if you line up first. Once they start general boarding you must go to the back of the line. Not very premium

The crew was mostly okay. The flight attendant who answered our questions was curt and unhelpful unfortunately. He seemed upset and I understand having off days.

Very bad! No good service delayed my second connection flight

They canceled flight. Hard to believe there was even a plane incoming for us to get on

Cancelled flight after I arrived at airport after 75 min drive and parking. Next flight was 4 days in the future. Had to scramble and buy a much more expensive flight on another carrier.

I liked the turn-style feature at gate 209B at LAX. Very efficient process. The gate staff also made several, clearly directed announcements so I felt very informed.

Plane was down graded and I lost my uncharged exit row with more leg room. No mention or offer of refund from podium. Flight attendant was nice to explain this happens often and that I could request a refund via online form submission. I did this and have heard nothing back.

Horrendous. I do not recommend Frontier. The passengers lack manners and decency, and the flight attendants lack professionalism. If I wasn’t in a bind to fly with 48 hours notice for a job interview, I would not have selected a flight with Frontier and I never plan to fly with them in the future.

The seats were hard molded plastic covered in plastic vinyl. And the scam to charge people extra to sit together. Don’t they know we can just ask someone to trade seats. And watching the staff separate young children from parents… super classy. We had to guilt them into offering up our seats. This companies policies suck. Don’t give them your money.

Traveling to a place near San Francisco?

Book flights to San Francisco if you plan to visit one of these locations
Calistoga
Marina
Pacifica
Capitola
Emeryville
Rohnert Park
Millbrae
Campbell
Mill Valley
Newark
Novato
Windsor
Belmont
Los Altos
Union City
Richmond
West Sacramento
Jenner
Corte Madera
American Canyon

Everything you need to know for your flight to San Francisco

Information on the airport you'll fly into in San Francisco

Not what you’re looking for? Find thousands of other hotels, flights, car rentals and package deals with KAYAK.