California Child Care Costs by County: 2022 Official Data

California's population-weighted median price for center-based infant care is $379.21 per week — $1,643/month, $19,719/year — according to the U.S. Department of Labor's 2022 National Database of Childcare Prices (NDCP), the most recent official vintage. That makes California the 5th most expensive state in the country for infant care, trailing only Washington, D.C., Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Colorado, and running 55.6% above the U.S. median of $243.75/week.

Key takeaways

• California median (infant, center-based): $379.21/week — the 5th-highest of any state.
• Most expensive county: San Francisco County, at $606.61/week — the highest of any county in the U.S.
• Least expensive county: Imperial County, at $221.78/week — still above the national median.
• Full data coverage: all 58 California counties report an official 2022 price — no gaps.
• Family care is cheaper for infants: $284.37/week statewide vs. $379.21 at a center.

How much does child care cost in California, by age?

California's population-weighted state medians cover every age group DOL tracks. Center-based care is more expensive than family (home-based) care for infants and toddlers, but the gap narrows — and nearly disappears — for preschool and school-age children:

• Infant: $379.21/week center · $284.37/week family
• Toddler: $238.16/week center · $238.07/week family
• Preschool: $224.99/week center · $223.63/week family
• School-age: $198.58/week center · $186.06/week family

School-age prices reflect a school-year, part-day arrangement rather than full-day year-round care, so they aren't directly comparable to the infant/toddler/preschool figures above.

The most expensive counties in California

Five San Francisco Bay Area counties dominate the top of California's ranking for center-based infant care. All five figures below are DOL-flagged as statistically imputed rather than directly observed — the official value, produced by DOL's own estimation method rather than a raw survey response.

• San Francisco County — $606.61/week (highest in the U.S.)*
• San Mateo County — $554.56/week*
• Marin County — $548.16/week*
• Santa Clara County — $527.14/week*
• Alameda County — $515.91/week*

* Value statistically imputed by DOL.

The least expensive counties in California

At the other end of the state, five rural Northern California counties report the lowest prices — all also DOL-imputed:

• Imperial County — $221.78/week*
• Trinity County — $224.43/week*
• Del Norte County — $224.43/week*
• Plumas County — $224.43/week*
• Lassen County — $224.43/week*

Even California's cheapest county, Imperial, sits above the U.S. median of $243.75/week — a reminder that "least expensive" is relative to a high-cost state, not to the country as a whole.

Major metro breakdown

Prices for California's five largest county-level metro areas, center-based, by age group:

• Los Angeles County — infant $256.98 · toddler $220.77 · preschool $224.99 · school-age $198.58
• San Diego County — infant $379.21 · toddler $269.21 · preschool $242.61 · school-age $218.95
• Orange County — infant $393.71 · toddler $281.67 · preschool $253.84 · school-age $238.68
• Sacramento County — infant $346.92 · toddler $221.38 · preschool $260.50 · school-age $217.05
• San Francisco County — infant $606.61 · toddler $433.45 · preschool $477.04 · school-age $437.63

Notably, Orange County's infant-care price ($393.71) exceeds San Francisco's toddler price, and Los Angeles County — the state's most populous by far — is actually cheaper for infant care than San Diego, Orange, Sacramento, or San Francisco counties. County population size does not reliably predict price in California's data.

San Diego County's own infant-center price, $379.21, exactly matches California's statewide median. That isn't a coincidence of rounding: ChildcareCost's state and national medians are a population-weighted median of county medians — a selection estimator that always lands on one real county's actual price, rather than an average computed between counties.

Browse every California county

For the full county-by-county price table, income comparison, and year-over-year trend, see the California state page. Individual county pages include the same data for Los Angeles County, San Francisco County, and every other county in the state. To estimate your own family's cost against the federal affordability benchmark, use the childcare cost calculator.