This is from a 2000 Census site called "Counting California". I found it by googling "California population". It should also be noted that the number is not only six years old (from 2006), but is only counting the cities themselves. Each city has many more "residents" due to suburbs and surrounding counties...

1) Los Angeles............3,694,820 La Gran Enchilada.

This is the giant. I lived in West LA for two years. I attended UCLA, right next to Bel Air on Sunset Boulevard. I looked but I never saw the Fresh Prince. The county has well above 9 million residents , more like 10, especially if you consider the undocumented immigrants and the homeless, who themselves count more than many top ten cities of other states (estimates ranging from 25 to 60 thousand).

Plus, there are neighboring counties such as Ventura, Orange, San Bernardino (where I lived four years) and Riverside that have large populations that are so close (15-60 minutes)  that they can be thrown in as well.

The bordering cities in the top 10 that can be enveloped by Greater LA are in relative order of distance: Long Beach, Anaheim and Santa Ana. And there are some other major cities not much further away: Riverside, San Bernardino, Ontario, Fontana, etc...

They had a vote a few years back to separate and partition the San Fernando Valley (north LA) as its own city. I was for it, but the "poor south" voted heavily against the public ballot measure.

It would have created a new city of some 1.6 million inhabitants, I think making it the 6th biggest in the nation. Oh well. LA the great! And terrible. No, just kidding. The only terrible things were prices and traffic...And a bit of crime. And Kobe. (Just kidding.) 

Anaheim city

328,014

                                                  

Fresno city	427,652
Long Beach city	461,522
Los Angeles city	3,694,820
Oakland city	399,484
Sacramento city	407,018
San Diego city	1,223,400
San Francisco city	776,733
San Jose city	894,943
Santa Ana city	337,977

 

A bit more later, such as the demystification...As I call it. And now I think this will be saved for part two or three...The first part will only be on LA, the 800 pound surgically enhanced gorilla.

All right, time to finish this first part, more dedicated to the Greater Area of LA, which as explained earlier encompasses three of the other top ten towns plus a plethora of others.

The first thing about this area of 10-20 million (depending on where you put geographic limits to the extent of the cities: i.e. Palmdale, Santa Barbara, Beaumont or even out to the San Bernardino mountain communities or out to the High Desert and the Mojave with the Palms Springs towns, not to mention Orange county moving down to San Diego...)

NO NFL TEAMS! This is crazy, can we all admit? It's great that

These other cities in part two and three:

2) San Diego ----Yes

3) San Jose-----Yes

4) San Francisco-Yes

5) Long Beach (not so much)

6) Fresno --------Yes

7) Sacramento---Yes

8) Oakland------Yes

9) Santa Ana-----(Not so much)

10) Anaheim------(Not so much, because of the Greater LA thing...)