Kern County, California

Kern County is a county in California, United States, about 110 miles north of Los Angeles at the southern end of the San Joaquin Valley. It had a population of 909,235 at the 2020 census, an estimated 927,068 by 2025, and covers 8,132 square miles (21,060 km2) centred near 35°20′N 118°43′W.

Bakersfield is the county seat, and its main postal code is 93301. The county holds 11 incorporated cities and 71 census-designated places across three distinct regions — the San Joaquin Valley farmland, the Tehachapi and Greenhorn mountains, and the Mojave Desert — and it runs on Pacific time. Its FIPS code is 06029.

Towns & Villages in Kern County

Kern County has 82 recognized places in all: 11 incorporated cities and 71 census-designated places (CDPs). The table below lists every city; the second table covers the county’s 14 most populous CDPs. City · seat marks Bakersfield; City marks the other ten; CDP marks an unincorporated community with its own Census boundary.

Beyond the cities, 71 CDPs cover everything from Bakersfield’s older unincorporated fringe to remote desert mining camps. The 14 largest by population:

The other 57 CDPs are smaller still — desert crossroads like Randsburg and Johannesburg, mountain communities like Glennville and Pine Mountain Club, and farm hamlets like Edison and Lost Hills — none over 1,000 people. Two pairs cause confusion: Kernville, the resort town at the north end of Lake Isabella, is a different place from Kern City, an older unincorporated pocket on Bakersfield’s west side that was never separately incorporated. And Taft and South Taft are adjacent but separate CDPs — South Taft is not a neighborhood of Taft on the map, it has its own Census boundary just south of the city line.

ZIP Codes

• 93301–93309, 93311–93314, 93380–93390, 93399 — Bakersfield (also serves Bakersfield Country Club and much of Rosedale)
• 93308 — Oildale
• 93215 — Delano (also serves Casa Loma)
• 93555 — Ridgecrest
• 93280 — Wasco
• 93263 — Shafter
• 93203 — Arvin
• 93505 — California City
• 93250 — McFarland
• 93561 — Tehachapi (also serves Bear Valley Springs and Golden Hills)
• 93268 — Taft and South Taft
• 93252 — Maricopa
• 93560 — Rosamond
• 93241 — Lamont
• 93501 — Mojave
• 93240 — Lake Isabella
• 93516 — Boron
• 93205 — Bodfish
• 93238 — Kernville
• 93206 — Buttonwillow
• 93527 — Inyokern

Several of the smallest desert and mountain communities — Randsburg, Johannesburg, Squirrel Mountain Valley and others among the county’s 57 smallest CDPs — have no post office of their own and are served by a neighboring town’s ZIP code or rural route.

Geography

Kern County splits into three landscapes. The San Joaquin Valley floor covers the western and central third — flat, heavily irrigated farmland running from Buttonwillow and Lost Hills in the north to Arvin and Lamont in the south. The Tehachapi Mountains and southern Sierra Nevada rise along the county’s south and east edge, cut by Isabella Lake and the upper Kern River, and reach 8,822 feet at Sawmill Mountain. East of the mountains the land drops into the Mojave Desert, home to Edwards Air Force Base, the China Lake naval range, and the wind farms around Tehachapi and Mojave — one of the windiest gaps in the country. Water is scarce; Isabella Lake, formed by a dam on the Kern River, is the county’s only large reservoir, and the California Aqueduct carries most of the water crossing the valley floor.

Kern County borders eight other counties. Tulare County lies to the north along with Kings County, San Luis Obispo County to the west, Santa Barbara County and Ventura County to the southwest, Los Angeles County to the south, San Bernardino County to the southeast, and Inyo County to the northeast. Kings County does not currently have a live California page on this site to link to — its slug here redirects to the New York county of the same name.

Demographics

Kern County had 909,235 residents at the 2020 census, estimated at 927,068 by 2025. Bakersfield, with 403,455 people, holds nearly half the county’s population; Delano, at 51,428, is a distant second. Hispanic and Latino residents make up 54.9% of the county, making Kern California’s third-most-populous majority-Hispanic county. Median household income was $70,210 in 2024, well below the California figure of $99,122. Population density works out to roughly 112 people per square mile, though almost all of that population sits on the valley floor — the desert and mountain thirds of the county are sparsely settled.

Economy & Local Life

Agriculture and petroleum anchor the county’s economy. Kern leads California in oil production, and the Kern River, Elk Hills and Midway-Sunset fields near Bakersfield and Taft are among the largest oil fields in the continental United States. Agriculture employs 37,801 workers countywide, with almonds, grapes, citrus and pistachios grown on the valley floor around Delano, Wasco, Shafter and Arvin; health care and social assistance is the single largest sector at 45,581 workers, followed by retail trade at 39,956. Edwards Air Force Base and the Naval Air Weapons Station at China Lake, near Ridgecrest, add a major aerospace-testing presence. The Tehachapi and Mojave passes hold some of the densest wind-turbine development in the country. Bakersfield is also the historic home of the “Bakersfield Sound,” the twangy country style built by Buck Owens and Merle Haggard in the 1950s and ’60s, and the county fair each September remains the region’s biggest annual event.

History

Kern County was organized on April 2, 1866, carved out of Tulare and Los Angeles counties. It takes its name from the Kern River, itself named for Edward Kern, a topographer on John C. Frémont’s 1845 expedition who nearly drowned crossing it. Oil defined the county’s early 20th century: the Kern River oil field, discovered in 1899, triggered one of the country’s first major petroleum booms and drew thousands of workers to Bakersfield and Taft within a few years. On July 21, 1952, a magnitude 7.3 earthquake centered near Wheeler Ridge — the strongest in California in the 20th century apart from 1906 — killed 12 people and heavily damaged Bakersfield’s downtown, and a magnitude 5.8 aftershock a month later killed two more and finished off buildings already weakened.

Getting There

Interstate 5 crosses the western edge of the county along the valley floor; State Route 99 runs through Bakersfield, Delano and Wasco as the main north-south route through the farm belt; State Route 58 is the principal east-west link to the desert towns and Tehachapi.

• Los Angeles — 110 miles south via I-5
• Fresno — 110 miles north via SR-99
• Las Vegas — 230 miles east via SR-58 and US-395
• San Francisco — 285 miles northwest via I-5

Bakersfield Meadows Field is the county’s commercial airport, with regional service to Los Angeles, San Francisco, Denver, Phoenix, Las Vegas and Seattle. Amtrak’s San Joaquins line stops at Bakersfield Station, connecting north to the Bay Area and Sacramento with a Thruway bus link south to Los Angeles.

Frequently Asked Questions

Where is Kern County?
It sits at the southern tip of California’s San Joaquin Valley, spanning from farmland in the west across mountains to the Mojave Desert in the east, about 110 miles north of Los Angeles.

What is the population of Kern County?
909,235 at the 2020 census, estimated at 927,068 by 2025.

How big is Kern County?
8,132 square miles (21,060 km2) — the third-largest county in California by area.

What is the county seat of Kern County?
Bakersfield, the county’s largest city with 403,455 residents.

How many towns and cities are in Kern County?
11 incorporated cities and 71 census-designated places, 82 recognized places in all.

What ZIP codes cover Kern County?
Bakersfield spans 93301–93309 and several adjoining ranges; other cities each have their own code, from 93203 (Arvin) to 93561 (Tehachapi). The full list is above.

Why is Kern County known for oil?
The Kern River oil field, discovered in 1899, and the later Elk Hills and Midway-Sunset fields near Taft and Bakersfield rank among the largest ever found in the continental United States, and Kern still leads all California counties in oil production.

More counties in this state: Towns and villages in California.