San Francisco Bulky Item Pickup: Recology Rules, Limits & Alternative Options

Getting a couch out of a third-floor flat in San Francisco is a different problem from getting one out of a house with a driveway. The staircase is narrow, there’s no elevator, and the loading zone is whatever patch of sidewalk you can claim out front. A lot of San Francisco is built this way, and that shapes everything about how bulk-item pickup works here.

San Francisco’s bulky item pickup is handled by Recology, not a city sanitation department. The program offers free curbside collections twice a year for smaller buildings and once per unit for larger ones, with up to 10 items per appointment. It handles collection from the curb, but what happens between the third floor and the sidewalk is still on you.

Here’s how San Francisco’s program works, what items it covers, and what to do when it doesn’t.

Recology is San Francisco’s sole-source residential hauler. The Bulky Item Collection program is free for SF residents with active accounts and available to both homeowners and apartment tenants.

Annual limits

• Buildings with 5 units or fewer: 2 free bulky item collections per calendar year
• Buildings with 6 or more units: 1 free collection per unit per calendar year (each tenant can schedule their own)
• Unused collections do not roll over to the next year. They reset on January 1
• Additional collections beyond the free allowance are available for a fee; contact Recology at (415) 330-1300

How to schedule

• Online: recology.com/recology-san-francisco/bulky-item-collection/
• Phone: (415) 330-1300
• Email: customerservice@recologysf.com

Schedule at least 2 weeks in advance. Appointments are Monday through Friday only. To cancel, call or email by 12 PM the business day before your appointment. If you scheduled a Monday pickup, that means by noon on Friday.

Setout rules

• Place items curbside after 6 PM the evening before your scheduled pickup
• Items must be in place by 6 AM on the morning of your appointment
• Attach a visible sign reading “RECOLOGY” to your items
• Do not block the sidewalk. Keep items next to the curb
• Up to 10 items per appointment

The full accepted items list is on Recology’s website. Here are the most commonly requested items with any prep requirements.

Recology also hosts District Weekend Cleanup Events throughout the year where residents can bring items that don’t fit the standard program. St. Vincent de Paul attends these events and accepts gently used clothing, shoes, books, small appliances, and electronics on-site.

Most cities make electronics the awkward exception: a separate appointment, a special event, or a drop-off facility you have to find on your own.

In San Francisco, electronics go in the standard Recology bulky item pickup alongside furniture and appliances. TVs, computers, monitors, phones, and audio equipment are all included at no extra charge beyond your annual free pickups.

This is how California’s SB 20 Electronic Waste Recycling program works in practice. Recology collects covered devices and routes them to proper recycling. Senate Bill 1215, effective January 1, 2026, expanded the program to include battery-embedded products: smartphones, wearables, and tablets are now covered alongside TVs and monitors.

For electronics disposal when you’ve exhausted your annual Recology pickups, or when you have more than a single appointment’s worth, the SF Transfer Station accepts all electronics (TVs, monitors, laptops, and small devices) at no charge. See the Transfer Station section below for hours and details.

For larger electronics volumes (tech sector and office cleanouts)

GreenCitizen’s EcoCenter in Burlingame accepts laptops, desktops, monitors, TVs, tablets, phones, and networking gear. Drop-off requires no appointment and is free for California-origin covered SB 20 devices. Open Monday through Friday, 10 AM to 6 PM. Visit greencitizen.com for the full accepted items list and directions.

Recology’s accepted items list includes a general exclusion for anything over 100 pounds. The exception: items specifically named as accepted qualify regardless of weight. Residential refrigerators, washers, dryers, and stoves are on that list, so they qualify for curbside pickup even when they’re heavy. The 100-pound limit applies to items that are not on the explicit accepted list.

Cast iron bathtubs are explicitly excluded regardless of weight. Same with pianos. For SF residents renovating Victorian and Edwardian buildings (which often means a cast iron tub in the bathroom and a piano in the parlor), these are frequently the exact items involved.

What this means in older SF housing stock

San Francisco’s Richmond, Sunset, Noe Valley, Mission, Castro, and Haight-Ashbury neighborhoods are dense with Victorian and Edwardian buildings from the 1880s through the early 1900s. These buildings share physical characteristics that create specific disposal challenges:

• Interior staircases typically 28 to 32 inches wide
• Three or four stories, no elevator in most buildings
• No driveway; loading access is from the sidewalk in front
• Units stacked vertically with often-narrow vestibules at ground level

Recology’s program handles collection from the curb. The program doesn’t enter homes, carry items down stairs, or provide any handling from inside the unit. For residents in a third-floor Richmond flat or a Mission Edwardian with a tight staircase, getting a sofa or old refrigerator from the unit to the sidewalk is an entirely separate problem from the Recology pickup itself.

For furniture and large items that need to be carried out of an upper-floor flat, appliances that need maneuvering through tight spaces, or anything over 100 pounds that doesn’t qualify for curbside, a private hauler who can carry items out of your home is the practical solution.

When an item doesn’t qualify for curbside pickup, when you’ve used your annual free appointments, or when you need same-day disposal, the SF Transfer Station is the alternative. It’s open seven days a week and run by Recology.

Address: 501 Tunnel Avenue, San Francisco, CA 94134
Phone: 415-330-1400

Transfer Station hours:

• Monday through Friday: 7 AM to 4:30 PM
• Saturday and Sunday: 7:30 AM to 4 PM
• Closed Christmas Day and New Year’s Day

HHW Facility hours: Thursday through Saturday, 8 AM to 4 PM. Closed New Year’s Day, July 4th, Thanksgiving, day after Thanksgiving, Christmas Day, and day after Christmas.

A minimum $60 fee per load applies to all loads entering the facility. Electronics are the exception. See the fee table below.

The electronics drop-off at the Transfer Station is the most complete option in SF. Every screen-based device and small electronic is accepted at no charge, seven days a week, no appointment needed. For mattress recycling, the Transfer Station participates in the Bye Bye Mattress program. Find other California drop-off locations at byebyemattress.com/find-a-facility/.

Recology’s SF bulky item program covers San Francisco addresses only. If you’re in the East Bay or elsewhere in the metro, different haulers and different rules apply.

Oakland: Oakland Public Works handles bulk item pickup separately through the City of Oakland. Rules, schedules, and accepted items are separate from SF. For items that need a private hauler, LoadUp serves Oakland with the same availability as SF.

Berkeley: Berkeley has its own solid waste division and bulk item rules. Contact Berkeley Public Works for current scheduling. LoadUp also serves Berkeley.

If you’re unsure whether your address falls within San Francisco city limits, your Recology account status will confirm it. Only addresses with an active Recology Sunset Scavenger or Recology Golden Gate account qualify for the SF bulky item program.

Two free pickups a year handles most routine situations. It doesn’t handle all of them.

• The item is a cast iron tub, a piano, or something else explicitly excluded from the program
• The item is on the third floor of a Victorian flat with no elevator and needs to be carried down. Recology doesn’t enter buildings
• You’ve used both annual pickups and the next one is months away
• You have construction or renovation debris: not accepted curbside under any circumstances
• You need same-day pickup and the 2-week scheduling window doesn’t work
• You have commercial appliances from a home office or small business closing

If the staircase is the problem, the item doesn’t qualify, or the timing doesn’t work, LoadUp provides junk removal across San Francisco, including bulk item pickup with same-day and next-day availability. No annual limit, no 2-week lead time, no weight restriction. Loaders are independent contractors who carry items out from inside the unit: through the staircase, around the tight corner, down to street level. That’s the part the Recology program doesn’t cover.

For furniture and household items still in usable condition, LoadUp routes eligible pieces to donation partners including Goodwill, Salvation Army, Habitat for Humanity, and the Furniture Bank Association of North America before anything goes to disposal. Through the Plant with Purpose program, every LoadUp pickup contributes to reforestation efforts nationwide.

LoadUp runs 20-30% below what most junk removal companies charge for comparable work in San Francisco.