Los Angeles, CA population, income and ZIP codes

Los Angeles city is a major city in California, with 3,857,897 residents counted in the Census American Community Survey 2019-2023 ACS 5-year estimates, which places it first of 1,618 ranked by population. The median age here is 36.9 years against 39.1 nationally, a slightly younger profile than the country as a whole. At this size the Census also publishes one-year estimates; the five-year values used here are steadier and let you compare against smaller neighbours on the same basis.

Households in Los Angeles city earn a median of $80,366 a year, 2.3% above the national figure of $78,538 and 12% below the $91,111 median for the 1,050 California cities we cover. The median is the midpoint household, not an average, so a handful of very high earners cannot drag it upward the way they distort a mean. Poverty reaches 16.5% of residents here, above the 12.4% national rate.

The typical owner-occupied home in Los Angeles city is valued at $879,500, 189.9% above the national figure and 49% above the $589,600 peer median, while median gross rent runs $1,879 a month, 33.6% above the national figure, or roughly $22,548 across a full year. A household on the local median income would put about 28.1% of gross pay toward that rent against the federal 30% cost-burden threshold, so renting here is within the standard affordability guideline. The home-price-to-income ratio works out to 10.9×, against roughly 3.9× nationally, so buying is out of reach on local earnings alone and the ownership market leans on outside income, equity or dual high earners. 36.3% of occupied homes are owner-occupied versus 65% nationally, a renter-majority market, so rent figures matter more here than the home-value line. Gross rent folds in the utilities a tenant pays separately, so it is closer to the real monthly outlay than a headline rent figure.

Home values sit at 10.9× median household income, far past the 3.9× national mark, so ownership costs here are set by something other than local wages — second homes, retirees with equity, or commuters earning elsewhere. Median income runs above the national figure while poverty also runs above it — a split distribution, not a uniformly comfortable place. Averages hide that; the two numbers together do not.

No figure on this page is estimated by us; each one comes straight from the published ACS tables for this area. Small-area estimates still carry wider margins of error than state or national figures, so check the linked ACS tables before relying on them for lending, appraisal or legal work.