List of tallest buildings in San Francisco

M. H. de Young, owner of the San Francisco Chronicle, commissioned Burnham and Root to design a signature tower to convey the power of his newspaper.

[4] Not to be outdone, de Young's rival, industrialist Claus Spreckels, purchased the San Francisco Call in 1895 and commissioned a tower of his own that would dwarf the Chronicle Building.

[11] This surge of construction was dubbed "Manhattanization" by opponents and led to local legislation that set some of the strictest building height limits and regulations in the country.

[14] To prevent excessive growth and smooth the boom-and-bust building cycle, the Plan included an annual limit of 950,000 square feet (88,000 m2) for new office development, although it grandfathered millions of square feet of proposals already in the development pipeline.

[15][16] These limits, combined with the early 1990s recession, led to a significant slowdown of skyscraper construction during the late 1980s and 1990s.

This list ranks San Francisco skyscrapers that stand at least 400 feet (122 m) tall, based on standard height measurement.

* Table entries with dashes (—) indicate that information regarding building floor counts or dates of completion has not yet been released.