[3] It is located at the north central part of the province, about 19 kilometres (12 mi) west of Catarman, the provincial capital, and about 30 kilometres (19 mi) east of Allen, where the ferry terminal is which connects the islands of Luzon, Samar, Leyte, and Mindanao via the Pan-Philippine Highway (formerly the Maharlika Highway).

It is approximately 150 kilometres (93 mi) north-north-east of Tacloban City, the Regional Center of the Eastern Visayas.

The Municipality of San Jose grew from a place that was then covered with bushes, shrubs, zacates, and marshes, where wild chicken, locally known as ilajas, abounded.

It was then called carangian, being the site where hunters assembled their trap, known as carang, to catch wild chickens.

In that year, the governor of Samar, Pedro Arteche, conducted a plebiscite for the conversion of Barrio Carangian into a municipality.

San Jose's total land area of 2,985 hectares (7,380 acres) is generally underlain by well-bedded and moderately undulating terrain.

In the surveyed area, mangrove swamps dominate the western part of the municipality which extends to its northern coastline.

Vegetation in this area generally consists of mangrove trees and shrubs, cogonal growth, and coconuts.

The Port of San Jose is a reinforced concrete general purpose pier handling passengers and domestic cargoes, situated in Barangay North.

Carangian (San Jose) is home to local notable persons in politics the Carangianons are proud of, to wit: