San Diego is an established California cannabis market with a mature retail sector and growing demand for licensed cultivation, manufacturing, and distribution properties.

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The City of San Diego regulates cannabis retail, cultivation, manufacturing, testing, and distribution through its own licensing and conditional use permit process, while unincorporated San Diego County and other incorporated cities within the county maintain separate ordinances that range from permissive to prohibitive . Zoning for cannabis retail is generally limited to specific commercial and industrial corridors with required buffers from schools and youth-oriented uses, while cultivation and manufacturing uses are concentrated in industrial-zoned areas, particularly in the county's inland and agricultural regions. This layered regulatory environment across the county's many jurisdictions makes entitled, licensed properties a limited and often competitively priced resource.

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San Diego's proximity to the U.S.-Mexico border, its large military and tourism-driven population, and its established biotech and agricultural research sectors support a diverse cannabis economy spanning retail, cultivation, and product manufacturing. The region's industrial infrastructure and access to Southern California distribution networks further support cannabis businesses operating at scale.

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Given the variation in local permitting requirements across San Diego's jurisdictions, acquiring an existing licensed cannabis business or operational property is often more efficient than pursuing new entitlement and ground-up development.