Work & commute · Los Altos

Work & commute in Los Altos, CA

Most working residents leave Los Altos for work: only 5% work in town. The top destinations are San Jose (11%), Mountain View (10%) and Sunnyvale (8%). Half commute less than 8 miles.

Census LEHD commute flows, 2023 Census ACS commute times

Work in town

625 of 12,658 working residents

Typical commute

8 mi

Half commute less than this, straight-line

Average commute time

22 min

One way, from the Census survey

Work from home

39%

of workers, from the Census survey

Coming and going

Who leaves, who stays, who comes in

On a workday 12,033 Los Altos residents head out of town to work, 625 work right here, and 10,427 people come in from elsewhere to fill jobs in Los Altos.

12,033live here, work elsewhere

625live and work here

10,427work here, live elsewhere

Leave for workStayCome in

The map

Where Los Altos goes to work

San Jose16.3 mi away

11%1,398

Mountain View2.4 mi away

10%1,298

Sunnyvale4 mi away

8%1,069

Palo Alto3.2 mi away

8%1,022

San Francisco56.9 mi away

8%977

Santa Clara7.1 mi away

6%776

Los Altos (in town)right here

5%625

Cupertino4.4 mi away

5%602

Menlo Park8.2 mi away

4%566

Stanford5.6 mi away

3%366

Everywhere elseother towns and states

31%3,959

Lines run between town centers; a thicker line means more commuters. The top 10 towns each way.

How far

How far Los Altos commutes

Straight-line distance from home to work, for every working resident. Roads add to it, so real drives run longer.

59%

20%

12%

59%Under 10 mi

20%10–24 mi

12%25–50 mi

9%Over 50 mi

Job hub or commuter town?

Los Altos is balanced between jobs and homes

0.87jobs per working resident

Balanced

About as many jobs as working residents (0.87 per resident).

The jobs

What the jobs in Los Altos are

11,052 jobs are based in Los Altos. Here is what they are, next to the jobs Los Altos’s own residents hold wherever they work.

Jobs based in Los Altos

11,052 jobs

Goods (factories, building, farms)4%

Trade, transport & utilities11%

Services (health, schools, offices…)85%

$1,250 a month or less9%

$1,251–$3,333 a month15%

Over $3,333 a month76%

Jobs Los Altos residents hold

12,658 working residents

Goods (factories, building, farms)16%

Trade, transport & utilities9%

Services (health, schools, offices…)76%

$1,250 a month or less7%

$1,251–$3,333 a month8%

Over $3,333 a month85%

+24%

Jobs based in Los Altos, 2013 → 2023: 8,911 → 11,052. Big swings can come from how a large employer reports its locations, not only from real openings or closings.

About these numbers

How to read this page

Every worker, home to workThe Census links each worker’s home block to their main job’s block, for jobs covered by unemployment insurance. That’s most jobs, but not the self-employed.

Where the employer saysA job counts where the employer reports it. Some big employers report one address for many sites, which can make a few commutes look longer than they are.

Two surveysFlows, distances and jobs: LEHD 2023. Commute time and working from home: the Census American Community Survey.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, LEHD Origin-Destination Employment Statistics (LODES 8), 2023, primary jobs; American Community Survey 5-year estimates.