A San Jose water system had the highest standardized estimate for water bills in the country: $1,416 for 60,000 gallons of water in 2025, excluding wastewater charges. The finding comes from a new national analysis that puts several Bay Area utilities among the priciest in the United States. The findings land as San Francisco, Marin and other local water agencies push through fresh rate hikes of their own, driven by aging pipes, costly new supply projects and ballooning capital budgets.
The nonprofit Food & Water Watch analyzed 2025 billing data from the 500 largest community water systems in the country, which together serve about 155 million people, or 45% of the U.S. population. The group found that average household drinking-water bills jumped 62% between 2015 and 2025, a pace that outstripped inflation, grocery prices and median household income growth over the same decade. Nationally, the typical system charged households $531 in 2025 for 60,000 gallons of water, but the range was staggering — from $133 at the cheapest system up to a standardized estimate of $1,416 for 60,000 gallons at San Jose Water, excluding wastewater charges, as first detailed by the San Francisco Chronicle.
California looms large in the report's findings. The state accounted for 52% of the 25 most expensive water systems nationwide despite representing just 18% of the systems studied, and four of the ten priciest systems in the country are in California. The report points to costly alternative water-supply projects, including desalination and other energy-intensive processes, as a driver of higher bills for some California utilities and their ratepayers.
Why the South Bay Pays More
The San Jose system cited as the nation's most expensive is investor-owned, and the report found that for-profit water corporations charged typical households an average of $823 in 2025, compared with $494 at publicly owned systems — a 67% gap, or roughly $329 more per year on average. Rate increases for that San Jose provider must be approved by the California Public Utilities Commission, which in one agenda resolution authorized the company to put new rates for general metered service and raw water service into effect five days after the resolution took hold, according to the commission's published filing.
San Jose Water's own published rate sheet shows an average household water bill of $144 a month, not including sewer service, a figure the Chronicle reported separately from the national ranking. Company officials have said they are managing rising costs while trying to prioritize customer affordability, framing recent investments as necessary for resilient infrastructure and water quality, per the same Chronicle account.
San Francisco and Marin Face Their Own Hikes
San Francisco is not escaping the squeeze either. The average single-family household's combined water and sewer bill is projected to climb from $171 a month to $189 this summer, then to $212 the following summer, the Chronicle reported. Residential water rates alone are set to rise 7% in both 2026 and 2027, while sewer rates are scheduled to jump 15% and then 14.5% in those same two years.
The ripple effects extend beyond city limits. The wholesale water rate the SFPUC charges suppliers in San Mateo, Santa Clara and Alameda counties is set to rise 7.4% this summer, more than triple the 2.3% increase those same suppliers saw the year before. East Bay Municipal Utility District is separately raising its water rates 6.5% and wastewater rates 8.5% in July.
A Nationwide Affordability Problem
Food & Water Watch found that water bills were unaffordable for low-income households in 93% of the systems it analyzed, and that bills nationally rose 19% faster than median household incomes over the past decade. The group says it undertook the analysis in part because federal tracking of water rates remains inadequate, leaving a gap that makes it hard for regulators and the public to see these trends coming. The organization's figures focus specifically on drinking-water service and generally exclude wastewater and stormwater charges, meaning they are not a direct stand-in for a household's full combined water-and-sewer bill.
Beyond San Jose and the Bay Area, the report's list of the 25 priciest U.S. water providers also includes systems in Escondido, Santa Barbara, Sacramento, Oceanside, Santa Maria, Vista Irrigation District, Helix Water District, Golden State Water Company and Otay Water District, along with utilities in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Oregon, Illinois and Massachusetts rounding out the list nationally.
Taken together, the numbers paint a picture of a basic utility bill that has quietly outpaced nearly every other household cost over the past decade — one that Bay Area residents are likely to keep feeling as local agencies work through their own pipelines of rate increases in the years ahead.
