California State University, Northridge (CSUN /ˈsiːsʌn/ or Cal State Northridge), is a public university in the Northridge neighborhood of Los Angeles, California, United States. With a total enrollment of 36,960 students (as of Fall 2025), it has the fourth largest total student body in the California State University system. The size of CSUN also has a major impact on the California economy, with an estimated $1.9 billion in economic output generated by CSUN on a yearly basis. As of Fall 2025, the university has 2,085 faculty members, of which around 37% are tenured or on the tenure-track.
California State University, Northridge, was founded first as the Valley satellite campus of California State University, Los Angeles. It then became an independent college in 1958 as San Fernando Valley State College, with major campus master planning and construction. In 1972, the university adopted its current name of California State University, Northridge. The 1994 Northridge earthquake caused $400 million (equivalent to $849 million in 2024) in damage to the campus, the heaviest damage ever sustained by an American college campus.
