San Francisco, CA

San Francisco is an expensive city, there’s no doubt about it. But you can do things for free around here if you bother to try. After all, it’s a city filled with people who find creative ways to make a life for themselves in a place that’s got the highest rents in the country. Here are eight free things to do in San Francisco on any given day:

1. People watch. It doesn’t matter where you go in the city, you’ll find people there that are interesting. You can sit anywhere, walk anywhere, wait in line anywhere and if you pay attention to the people around you for even a few minutes, you’ll find that your attention is captured. I’m convinced that nowhere has more unique people on a regular basis.

2. Museums. You can get into a number of the museums in this city for free on the first Tuesday or Wednesday of this month. This includes major museums like the SFMoMA and the DeYoung Museum as well as some spots that you’re less likely to think of as museums like The Exploratorium and The San Francisco Zoo.

3. Beach and bay. We don’t often think about hanging out by the beach in San Francisco because it’s not exactly beachy as far as California goes. After all, you’re not sunning in a place that’s often got fog, right? But there are beaches all around us, off of both the Pacific Coast and the Bay. Sure, you may have to wear a windbreaker but you can still spend lots of free hours doing beach activities.

4. Live music. Okay, so you have to pay for your drinks if you’re going out but San Francisco is really a city where it’s easy to find no-cover music. Grant and Green and Girodano Bros. are two North Beach examples of spots that have almost nightly music and no cover. But it’s happening in bars in basically every neighborhood.

5. Neighborhood exploration. That’s right, just walking around seeing what there is to see is totally free. And it’s fun in San Francisco because of the vast differences between all of the neighborhoods here. Every place has its own charm and its hidden secrets so check them out at no cost just to see what’s around you.

6. Libraries. Okay, so maybe you don’t usually go on vacation to kick it at the library. But have you seen the main library down by The Civic Center? It’s HUGE. Plus, there are always random free events at San Francisco’s libraries like lectures and readings.

7. Festivals. San Francisco loves its festivals. We have them for everything all year round. During the summer, there’s one going on basically every weekend. So, chances are, if you want to find one, you can. Check out the “city events” listings at the calendar at SF Station to see if there’s one coming up.

8. Window shop. It’s fun in San Francisco because it’s not a boring mall activity. Sure, there are all kinds of mall-like stores that you can window shop at, but you can do it in the open air down in the Union Square area. It feels very city to people who aren’t from here. And there are also all kinds of different boutiques in various neighborhoods (Grant Street has some good ones, Hayes Valley and Union Street are known for theirs). These places have unique designs and strange shops that you might not find in other cities so you get that San Francisco flavor just from checking them out.