Car shipping from San Diego, CA to Los Angeles, CA
Figures below are worked out for this specific corridor and dated.
Before pickup: why the carrier gives a pickup window, not an hour; how to prepare the car; and what the pickup inspection protects.
Driving cost: 120 mi × 76¢/mi (IRS rate) = $91, a 1-day drive. See the full math.
The route between San Diego and Los Angeles
I-5 for nearly the whole route, about 114 of the 120 miles.
No toll roads on the OSRM route.
How is this trip priced?
We have no written quote for this lane yet, so a person prices your request from a current carrier quote before anything is charged. At 120 miles this is the shortest lane we book, and short trips cost the most per mile: the 140-mile Orlando to Jacksonville quote came to $450, or $3.21 a mile. Driving the car yourself would cost about $91 at the IRS rate, so compare any quote against that drive plus your own way back before booking.
Check any quote, ours included, with the quote checker; quotes on other routes are on car shipping cost, and days on the truck by distance in the transit time estimator.
What can delay a shipment on this lane?
- Northbound, I-5 passes the U.S. Border Patrol checkpoint at San Clemente (mile marker 67, by the San Onofre weigh scales), where northbound traffic can be stopped. (U.S. Customs and Border Protection, read 2026-09-26)
Heading the other direction? See car shipping from Los Angeles, CA to San Diego, CA. Local pickup notes: Los Angeles.
Other in-state lanes we book in California
- San Francisco to Los Angeles 381 mi
- Los Angeles to Sacramento 384 mi
- San Diego to San Francisco 500 mi
- San Diego to Sacramento 504 mi
Sources: road miles and drive time from OpenStreetMap Nominatim geocoding and OSRM driving route (city centers), 2026-09-22, city center to city center (your addresses will change them a little). Drive cost: IRS standard mileage rate, irs.gov, read 2026-09-21. Transit band: typical open-carrier transit-day ranges by distance as published on public transit-time guides, read 2026-09-21. Route and toll notes: OSRM driving route, city center to city center, router.project-osrm.org, read 2026-09-24. We don't publish a shipping price for this lane yet because an honest price depends on a current quote; see how our pricing works.