In addition to operating over 81 bus routes with connecting bus service in the Sacramento area covering 438 square miles (1,134.4 km2), SacRT also operates a large light rail system, which ranks currently as the sixteenth busiest light rail system in the United States.

It also provided contracted bus service to neighboring Yolo County (covering West Sacramento, Davis and Woodland); those routes and operations were later taken over by Yolobus after its formation on January 3, 1982.

The SacRT system operates 76 bus routes, as of 2024, with service between 5:00 a.m. and 11:00 p.m. daily, and ending much earlier on weekends.

Frequencies range between every 15 and 90 minutes (redership dependant, some express buses run only a few times a day).

There has been proposals in the past to expand the service hours to late nights to accommodate passengers, businesses and communities, but have been slow to implement these ideas.

The most recent changes were announced in August 2012, and made plans to improve and expand bus services system-wide by 2017.

Known to the ridership as "The Neighborhood Ride" On April 9, 2010, at about 10:20 a.m. a Blue Line train struck a vehicle at 47th Ave crossing.

The crash happened near the Iron Point Station in Folsom at about 10 a.m. Investigators said the pedestrian was walking on the tracks and not paying attention to what was coming toward him.

On November 11, 2010, a pick-up truck ran into the side of a moving Regional Transit Light Rail Train at 10:15 a.m. at Starfire Drive and Folsom Boulevard in Sacramento County.

A Siemens light rail vehicle on a Gold Line train caught fire and started to smoke on December 23, 2010, at approximately 7:30 p.m. near the College Greens station.

The fire caused service disruptions to Gold Line trains traveling in both directions for up to an hour.

The accident took place at the crossing near the intersection of 25th Street and 26th Avenue just before 4:45 p.m, when a black Pathfinder SUV was hit by a southbound Blue Line train.

[16] There were no injuries reported, but catenary power in downtown Sacramento had to be shut down during the re-railing process, causing major service disruption.