San Bruno Commute Time Map & Patterns

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Commuting in San Bruno, California: how long it takes, when people leave home and how they get to work. Ask Map AI about any address.

You 9/24/26, 3:38 PM

How long is the round-trip commute in San Bruno?

Map AI 9/24/26, 3:38 PM

Commute Time Burden in San Bruno: Annual Hours and Cost

Commuters in San Bruno spend about 43 minutes on the road round trip each working day. Over a typical 250-day work year, that adds up to roughly 181 hours, about 7.5 full days, spent commuting. That is 8% less time on the road than the California average of 23.5 minutes each way, a difference of 1.8 minutes.

San Bruno holds about 0.1% of California's population and accounts for roughly 0.1% of its total commuting time.

Working from home just 2 days a week in San Bruno would save about 72 hours of drive time a year, worth roughly $2,240 at the same national wage assumption used above.

Area	One-Way Commute	Daily Round-Trip	Yearly Time Spent	Estimated Yearly Cost	Local Road Traffic (VPD)
San Bruno	21.7 min	43.3 min	181 hrs/yr	$5,599	3,918
California	23.5 min	47.0 min	196 hrs/yr	$6,065	2,449
United States	22.4 min	44.8 min	187 hrs/yr	$5,790	1,355

The estimated yearly cost applies a single national rule of thumb (U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics average hourly earnings), not a measurement of wages in this area - treat it as a rough estimate, not a paycheck figure. Local road traffic counts, vehicles per day on non-highway roads, come from proprietary Ticon and TrafficZoom data.

San Bruno Commute Map

On average, it takes 21.7 minutes to get to work in San Bruno. That's 3% shorter than the 22.4-minute U.S. average.

The most common departure window is 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM, followed by 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM. Driving is the most common commute choice, followed by working from home. About 18.6% work from home.

How People Get to Work in San Bruno

Riding a motorcycle is unusually rare in San Bruno: 2488.8 times less than the California average (0.0% vs 0.2%).

Commute Mode Trends in San Bruno, 2009-2024

This chart shows how workers in San Bruno get to work, as a share of all workers aged 16 and over, across 16 U.S. Census Bureau American Community Survey (ACS) releases from 2009 to 2024. Each release is a 5-year estimate: the 2024 figures cover surveys taken from 2020 to 2024. Because neighboring releases share most of their survey years, the lines move gradually, and a sudden change such as the rise of remote work in 2020 spreads across several releases. Hover over or tap a line to highlight it, and use the legend to show or hide a mode. Driving starts hidden so the smaller modes stay readable.

Share of workers aged 16 and over, by ACS 5-year release year. Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

Show commute mode data by year

Year	Car	Worked at Home	Public Transportation	Walked	Bicycle	Taxi	Other	Motorcycle
2009	84.3%	3.8%	8.0%	2.8%	0.4%	0.0%	0.5%	0.2%
2010	84.6%	3.0%	8.7%	2.6%	0.4%	0.0%	0.6%	0.2%
2011	85.1%	3.2%	8.8%	1.9%	0.4%	0.0%	0.5%	0.1%
2012	85.0%	3.2%	8.7%	1.4%	0.3%	0.0%	0.9%	0.5%
2013	83.0%	3.3%	11.3%	1.0%	0.5%	0.0%	0.6%	0.3%
2014	83.9%	2.5%	10.8%	1.6%	0.4%	0.0%	0.7%	0.2%
2015	82.4%	2.3%	11.6%	2.2%	0.4%	0.0%	0.8%	0.2%
2016	82.6%	2.1%	11.9%	1.7%	0.4%	0.0%	1.1%	0.2%
2017	81.4%	2.3%	13.2%	2.1%	0.3%	0.0%	0.5%	0.1%
2018	79.7%	2.6%	13.9%	2.3%	0.4%	0.1%	0.7%	0.3%
2019	76.8%	2.8%	15.8%	2.2%	0.5%	0.4%	0.8%	0.7%
2020	75.7%	6.0%	13.4%	1.8%	1.3%	0.4%	0.7%	0.6%
2021	72.7%	9.4%	11.8%	2.8%	1.5%	0.5%	0.8%	0.6%
2022	69.6%	14.9%	9.7%	2.6%	1.5%	0.4%	0.8%	0.4%
2023	69.8%	17.2%	6.7%	2.9%	1.4%	1.0%	0.7%	0.3%
2024	71.9%	18.6%	3.7%	3.2%	1.5%	0.6%	0.5%	0.0%

Driving was the most common way to get to work in every release from 2009 to 2024. Its share was highest in 2011 at 85.1% and lowest in 2022 at 69.6%. Overall it fell from 84.3% in 2009 to 71.9% in 2024, down 12.4 percentage points. It has risen in each of the last 2 releases.

Working from home gained the most ground in San Bruno: its share of workers rose from 3.8% in 2009 to 18.6% in 2024, up 14.8 percentage points. Most of that increase, 15.8 points, came in the releases after 2019, which include the pandemic years.

Public transit lost the most ground, falling from 8.0% to 3.7% of workers (down 4.3 percentage points).

Working from home overtook public transit to become the 2nd most common choice in the 2022 release and has stayed ahead since.

Commute Start Times in San Bruno

What Time Do People Leave for Work in San Bruno?

The bars show when commuters in San Bruno leave home for work, as a share of everyone who commutes (people who work from home are not counted), from the 2024 ACS 5-year estimates. The thin violet marks show California for comparison. Hover over or tap a row for the exact numbers.

12:00-4:59 AM		4.3%
5:00-5:29 AM		2.6%
5:30-5:59 AM		2.9%
6:00-6:29 AM		6.4%
6:30-6:59 AM		7.9%
7:00-7:29 AM		9.3%
7:30-7:59 AM		12.6%
8:00-8:29 AM		20.4%
8:30-8:59 AM		7.2%
9:00-9:59 AM		9.6%
10:00-10:59 AM		5.1%
11:00-11:59 AM		1.0%
12:00-3:59 PM		6.3%
4:00-11:59 PM		4.4%

San Bruno California Source: U.S. Census Bureau, ACS 5-year estimates

The busiest time to head out in San Bruno is 8:00-8:29 AM, when 20.4% of commuters leave home, compared with 12.6% across California. Early starts are less common than in California: 9.8% of commuters leave before 6 AM, versus 15.8% there. The morning rush is more concentrated than in California: 50.1% of departures fall in the two hours from 6:30 to 8:29 AM, versus 43.3% there. About 1 in 4 commuters (26.5%) leave at 9 AM or later, which usually points to shift work, flexible hours or part-time jobs.

When people leave matters as much as how far they go. Rush-hour traffic shrinks how much ground a 20-minute trip covers, so a trade area drawn as a simple circle often takes in neighborhoods that customers or staff would never drive from and misses others that are an easy trip. A drive-time zone, also called an isochrone, outlines every place within a set number of minutes of an address, which makes it the more honest way to size a store's catchment, a hiring area or the commute from a new home.

See it for yourself on the interactive map: click any spot in San Bruno, pick a 5, 10, 15 or 30-minute drive and see the local demographics of the people who live within that exact drive time.

Is San Bruno Waking Up Earlier? Typical Departure Time, 2009-2024

Each line follows the typical (median) departure time: the moment by which half of commuters have already left home. Higher on the chart means a later start. Setting San Bruno next to California and the U.S. shows whether local mornings are drifting earlier or later than everyone else's. The figures span 16 ACS 5-year releases, so changes build up gradually rather than jumping from one year to the next.

Median time commuters leave home, by ACS 5-year release year. Source: U.S. Census Bureau.

Show typical departure times by year

Year	San Bruno	California	United States
2009	7:58 AM	7:39 AM	7:37 AM
2010	7:58 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2011	7:58 AM	7:41 AM	7:38 AM
2012	8:01 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2013	8:00 AM	7:43 AM	7:39 AM
2014	8:00 AM	7:43 AM	7:39 AM
2015	7:58 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2016	7:57 AM	7:43 AM	7:38 AM
2017	7:55 AM	7:42 AM	7:38 AM
2018	7:53 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2019	7:57 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2020	7:59 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2021	8:04 AM	7:42 AM	7:37 AM
2022	8:04 AM	7:43 AM	7:37 AM
2023	8:05 AM	7:44 AM	7:38 AM
2024	8:06 AM	7:45 AM	7:38 AM

In 2024, half of commuters in San Bruno were on the road by 8:06 AM, 8 minutes later than in 2009 (7:58 AM). California followed the same path, with the typical start moving 6 minutes later. Commuters in San Bruno now leave 28 minutes later than the typical American commuter (7:38 AM). Since the 2019 release, which covers the years just before the pandemic, the typical start in San Bruno has moved 9 minutes later. The 2024 release is the latest typical start for San Bruno in the whole series.

How does San Bruno's commute time compare?

Metric	San Bruno	California	US Average
Avg. Commute Time	21.7 min	23.5 min	22.4 min
Departure Window	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM	07:00 AM – 07:29 AM
Secondary Departure Window	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM	08:00 AM – 08:29 AM	07:30 AM – 07:59 AM
Work From Home	18.6%	17.2%	15.0%
Walked	3.2%	2.4%	2.4%
Public Transit	3.7%	2.9%	3.2%

The average commute time in San Bruno is 21.7 minutes, shorter than the 23.5 minutes in California.

3.7% commute by public transit, higher than the 2.9% in California. 3.2% commute by walking, higher than the 2.4% in California.

Source: U.S. Census Bureau

San Bruno, CA Commute Compared With Nearby Cities

San Bruno, CA is the 2nd largest of the 5 cities compared here, 39,357 residents against a local median of 28,452. The measure that sets San Bruno, CA apart most is one-way commute: 21.7 min, 20% below the local median of 27.0 min. That is the better end of the local range on this measure.

Work from home tells the same story from another angle: 18.6% against a local median of 23.1%, 19% below it. The cities themselves sit within 3.5 min of each other on one-way commute, a tighter band than the gap between any of them and San Bruno, CA, which makes it a genuine outlier here rather than one end of a wide local spread. San Bruno, CA has the lowest one-way commute of the 5 areas compared here.

Area	Population	One-way commute	Work from home	Typical departure
San Bruno, CA	39,357	21.7 min #1/5	18.6% #4/5	8:06 AM #3/5
Millbrae, CA	22,069	27.2 min	22.2%	8:11 AM
Pacifica, CA	27,360	26.8 min	24.0%	7:53 AM
Daly City, CA	89,440	25.2 min	14.9%	8:01 AM
Burlingame, CA	29,545	28.7 min	27.5%	8:07 AM

Frequently Asked Questions

Common questions about commuting in San Bruno, California.

Is living in San Bruno, California good for avoiding long commute costs?

Commuters here spend an estimated 181 hours a year on the road, worth roughly $5,599 at a typical national wage. That's 8% less than the typical California commuter spends.

When is peak congestion during the morning commute in San Bruno, California?

Traffic peaks between 08:00 AM – 08:29 AM in San Bruno, California. Leaving before or after this window is the single easiest way to avoid the heaviest local congestion, though 07:30 AM – 07:59 AM also sees a secondary bump.