San Jose is located at the southern edge of the San Francisco Bay, anchoring the sprawling Santa Clara Valley. The city's geography is defined by its position in a broad valley basin, flanked by the Santa Cruz Mountains to the southwest and the Diablo Range to the east. Several major creeks and rivers intersect the city, most notably the Guadalupe River and Coyote Creek, which flow northward toward the San Francisco Bay.
The city encompasses a wide variety of environments, from the dense urban core and sprawling suburban tracts of the valley floor to the salt evaporation ponds in the northern Alviso neighborhood and the heavily wooded foothills to the east and south. The region sits near the San Andreas and Calaveras fault lines, making it an active geological zone.