Much of the county is located on the Cape May peninsula, bound by the Delaware Bay to its west and the Atlantic Ocean to its south and east.

[12] Before Cape May County was settled by Europeans, the Kechemeche tribe of the Lenape Native Americans inhabited South Jersey.

The county was named for Cornelius Jacobsen Mey, a Dutch captain who explored and charted the area from 1620 to 1621, and established a claim for the province of New Netherland.

[13] Before Cape May County was settled by Europeans, the indigenous Kechemeche tribe of the Lenape people inhabited South Jersey, and traveled to the barrier islands during the summer to hunt and fish.

[14] On August 28, 1609, English explorer Henry Hudson entered the Delaware Bay and stayed one day on land, north of what is now Cape May Point.

[14][26] In 1906, the eastern coastal boundary of Cape May County was established at a point 3 nautical miles (3.5 mi; 5.6 km) east of the coast.

The highest elevation is found at three areas in Belleplain State Forest in the county's northern corner, which are approximately 60 ft (18 m) above sea level.

The peninsula is bounded to the west by the Delaware Bay, and to the east is 1.5 to 3 mi (2.4 to 4.8 km) of marshes and water channels making up the Intracoastal Waterway.

[19] There were only four barrier islands from 1922, when Turtle Gut Inlet was filled in to create Wildwood Crest, until 1945, when Cape May Canal was constructed through the southern portion of the county.

In March 1962, a stalled coastal storm produced several days of extremely high tides along the barrier islands, which damaged the boardwalks of Cape May, Avalon, and Sea Isle City.

[47] In January 2016, a blizzard nicknamed "Winter Storm Jonas" produced record high tides in the county, reaching 9.0 ft (2.7 m) at the terminal for Cape May–Lewes Ferry, surpassing that of Hurricane Sandy.

[51] The suitable growing conditions led to West Cape May considering itself the "lima bean capital of the world", until Guatemala surpassed it in the 1990s.

Erosion during the Triassic and Jurassic periods formed valleys that gathered sediment, which deposited and layered as the coastline receded and rose.

The Great Egg Harbor River in its formative stage produced a delta that covered much of what is now Cape May County with sediment.

Around 14,000 years ago, glaciers began melting, and the barrier islands of Cape May County formed, likely from spits and lines of dunes.

Aside from maintaining law and order, the sheriff's responsibilities include the sale of property, overseeing the corrections facility, transporting of jurors, and collecting court-ordered judgments.

Van Drew subsequently changed his partisan affiliation in 2019 and won the county as a Republican over Democratic challenger Amy Kennedy by a margin of 34,627 (60.7%) to 21,899 (38.4%).

[90][91] The primary job sectors in Cape May County are related to hotel accommodation, food service, retail, health care/aide, arts/entertainment, and construction.

[97] The Bureau of Economic Analysis calculated that the county's gross domestic product was $5.0 billion in 2021, which was ranked 19th in the state and was a 6.4% increase from the prior year.

As of 2010, the four largest markets for tourism in Cape May County were Greater Philadelphia, North Jersey, New York, and the Canadian province of Québec.

[106] In the 1990s, Cape May County established an international tourism office in Montréal, along St. Catherine's Street,[107][108] but closed it around 1995, due to budget cuts.

[150][151] The plant's fuel source was scheduled to be changed to natural gas, pending the construction of the Atlantic Reliability Link through the Pinelands National Reserve.

[23] On November 9, 1989, the voters of Cape May County approved the Open Space Preservation Tax, which generates $4.9 million each year.

[159] Corson's Inlet State Park was established in 1969 near the southern end of Ocean City to protect and preserve one of the last undeveloped areas of land along the New Jersey coastline.

[160] Cape May Point State Park was established at the southern end of the county in 1974, having been previously used as a military base until the Ash Wednesday Storm of 1962 damaged the facility.

The act, and additional legislation from the New Jersey legislature, created the Pinelands Commission, which manages the growth in the Pine Barrens, and coordinates federal, state, and local governments.

[174] Tuckahoe Brewing also opened in 2011 in Ocean View, but moved to a bigger facility in Egg Harbor Township in neighboring Atlantic County in 2015.

[14] In 1695, John Somers operated the first ferry service across the Great Egg Harbor Bay to Beesley's Point in Cape May County.

Local businessmen built the Dennis Creek Causeway in 1803, which eventually became NJ 47, which contributed to the growth of towns along the Delaware Bay, although people traveled to the county more often by steamboat.

[219] In 2009, the Ocean City metropolitan statistical area, which encompasses all of Cape May County, ranked as the sixth highest in the United States for percentage of commuters who walked to work (8.4%).