North of the Mission District is the South of Market neighborhood, bordered roughly by Duboce Avenue and the elevated highway of the Central Freeway which runs above 13th Street.

The microclimates of San Francisco create a system by which each neighborhood can have different weather at any given time, although this phenomenon tends to be less pronounced during the winter months.

This climatic phenomenon becomes apparent to visitors who walk downhill from 24th Street in the west from Noe Valley (where clouds from Twin Peaks in the west tend to accumulate on foggy days) towards Mission Street in the east, partly because Noe Valley is on higher ground whereas the Inner Mission is at a lower elevation.

[9] The northeastern quadrant, adjacent to Potrero Hill is known as a center for high tech startup businesses including some chic bars and restaurants.

Ranchos owned by Spanish-Mexican families such as the Valenciano, Guerrero, Dolores, Bernal, Noé and De Haro continued in the area, separated from the town of Yerba Buena, later renamed San Francisco (centered around Portsmouth Square) by a two-mile wooden plank road (later paved and renamed Mission Street).

The lands around the nearly abandoned mission church became a focal point of raffish attractions[14] including bull and bear fighting, horse racing, baseball and dueling.

[15] From 1865 to 1891, a large conservatory and zoo known as Woodward's Gardens covered two city blocks bounded by Mission, Valencia, 13th and 15th streets.

[16] In the decades after the Gold Rush, the town of San Francisco quickly expanded, and the Mission lands were developed and subdivided into housing plots for working-class immigrants, largely German, Irish, and Italian,[14] and also for industrial uses.

As the city grew in the decades following the Gold Rush, the Mission District became home to the first professional baseball stadium in California, opened in 1868 and known as Recreation Grounds, seating 17,000 people, which was located at Folsom and 25th streets; a portion of the grounds remain as present day Garfield Square.

The Irish made their mark not only by working for the city government but by helping build the Catholic schools in the Mission District.

[18] Development and settlement intensified after the 1906 earthquake, as many displaced businesses and residents moved into the area, making Mission Street a major commercial thoroughfare.

The Irish American community made its mark on the area during this time, with notable residents such as etymologist Peter Tamony calling the Mission home.

During the 1940s to 1960s, a large number of Mexican immigrants moved into the area—displaced from an earlier "Mexican Barrio" located on Rincon Hill, demolished in order to create the western landing of the Bay Bridge—initiating white flight and giving the Mission a heavily Chicano/Latino character for which it continues to be known today.

[18] One political movement during the early 70s emerged in the community as seven young Latino men known as Los Siete de la Raza from the Mission District were being charged for the 1969 murder of a San Francisco police officer.

[18] The Women's Building, Osento Bathhouse, Old Wives Tales bookstore, Artemis Cafe, Amelia's and The Lexington Club were part of that community.

On South Van Ness, Target Video and Damage magazine were located in a three-story warehouse.

These immigrants brought in many Central American banks and companies which would set up branches, offices, and regional headquarters on Mission Street.

[32] However, the Mission remains the cultural nexus and epicenter of San Francisco's Mexican/Chicano, and to a lesser extent, the Bay Area's Nicaraguan, Salvadoran and Guatemalan community.

[33] As of 2017, the northern part of the Mission, together with the nearby Tenderloin, is home to a Mayan-speaking community, consisting of immigrants who have been arriving since the 1990s from Mexico's Yucatán region.

[35] There is also a high concentration of Salvadoran, Guatemalan, and Nicaraguan restaurants there as well as a large number of street food vendors.

The Mission's Galería de la Raza, founded by local artists active in el Movimiento (the Chicano civil rights movement), is a nationally recognized arts organization, also founded during this time of cultural and social renaissance in the Mission, in 1971.

Due to the existing cultural attractions, formerly less expensive housing and commercial space, and the high density of restaurants and drinking establishments, the Mission is a magnet for young people.

Poets, musicians, emcees, and other artists sometimes gather on the southwest corner of the 16th and Mission intersection to perform.

He often returned to the neighborhood, including for a live concert with his band Santana that was recorded in 1969,[45] and for the KQED documentary "The Mission" filmed in 1994.

[82] Mission Local is predominantly an online news site but does publish a semiannual printed paper.

The Mission District is a historic transit hub for the Chicano and the Latino community, especially on the 16th Street BART Plaza.

The majority of the residents in the Mission District are of minority and low-income families and use this useful and open hub for gatherings and doing local businesses such as food trucks.

They created a group called the "Plaza 16 Coalition" in response to the gentrification and the new zoning law, the "Eastern Neighborhoods Plan".