The venue originally opened in 1972 as a restaurant in Berkeley, later moving to Claremont Avenue in Oakland.

The venue began as a Japanese restaurant in Berkeley established by Yoshie Akiba, Kaz Kajimura and Hiroyuki Hori, the club soon moved to a larger space on Claremont Avenue and began to feature live jazz music.

[2][3] On November 28, 2007, it opened a second 28,000-square-foot (2,600 m2) location in San Francisco's Fillmore District, as a flagship of the city's attempt to restore the formerly African American neighborhood (which was uprooted in the 1970s by urban renewal) as a center of black culture and jazz.

[4] On July 1, 2014, Yoshi's San Francisco was purchased by Fillmore Live Entertainment Group.

[6][7][8] Roy Haynes was the featured performer on the opening night of the new San Francisco location.