The CSF features blue-ribbon animal displays, culinary delights and competitions, live music concerts, a carnival, fireworks, and other family fun.

[5] According to an editorial published in the Daily Alta California on November 5, 1850, fairs were common on the east coast of the United States.

They believed the newborn state had potential to hold a great "exhibition that would astonish the world", comparing its accomplishments to "the poet's imagined Minerva, when she burst full armed from the brain of Jove, through the cleft made by Vulcan's ponderous axe, appeared as powerful and mighty as ever after, when years had added to his fancy if not to her power.

We compare California to the same goddess of War, and although she has not come to perfect maturity, yet her advent has been almost as sudden, and her inherent qualities as full and abundant.

An Agricultural Hall for exhibits was built near what is now Golden 1 Center on Capitol Mall, at the northeast corner of Sixth and M Streets in Sacramento.

The cornerstone of Agricultural Hall was laid on July 1, 1859,[17] and it was completed in time to host the fair's opening ceremonies, held on September 12.

[20] Eventually, a new Cattle Grounds site was purchased,[21] encompassing six blocks bounded by E, H, 20th, and 22nd streets;[22] the State Fair finally was given official, permanent residence there in 1861.

[23] The State Fair outgrew both Agricultural Hall and the Cattle Ground site: a new exhibit hall pavilion was completed in 1884 at 15th and N in what is now Capitol Park,[9]: 8 [22] and the fairground moved in 1909 to a new 80-acre (32 ha) site just outside Sacramento city limits, northeast of the intersection of Stockton Boulevard and Broadway;[1] this subsequently was expanded to 155 acres (63 ha) in 1937.

[1] After the move to Cal Expo, the Stockton Boulevard fairgrounds were sold to the University of California; Governor's Hall (4611 Broadway), which served as the Fair's concert venue and later as the Sacramento County Primary Care Center,[24] marked the fair's entrance while the former Agricultural Pavilion (2922 Stockton) is now a facility in the UC Davis Medical Center Sacramento campus.

[33] There is a permanent monorail system at the fairgrounds, designed by Habegger Maschinenfabrik (later absorbed into Von Roll) and built under license by Universal Mobility, Inc. (then called Constam Corporation, based in Salt Lake City) in 1968.

There are four different trams, which are only used during the state fair to allow people to view the many areas of Cal Expo[34] along a 1 mi (1.6 km) track; the ride takes approximately 10 minutes, moving at a top speed of 6 mph (9.7 km/h).