Best of Palo Alto (Palo Alto Weekly): How Voting Works & How to Win

What is Best of Palo Alto and who runs it?

Best of Palo Alto is the reader-choice awards programme published each year by the Palo Alto Weekly, the community newspaper for Palo Alto, California. The awards run inside the paper's Palo Alto Online operation, whose masthead credits Embarcadero Media Foundation as copyright holder alongside the Redwood City Pulse title.

The paper sums the programme up in its own words as an "annual reader-choice guide to the local restaurants, shops, services, and experiences the community loves most." In practice that means the honorees come from the public: residents fill out a ballot naming the businesses they rate highest, and the paper publishes the outcome. No judging panel or shortlist stage appears in the programme's own description.

The ballot itself lives on the newspaper's own website at https://www.paloaltoonline.com/best-of-palo-alto/ , so supporters deal directly with the publisher rather than installing an app or visiting a separate polling service. Coverage centres on everyday commerce in the city: restaurants, shops, service providers and the local businesses the paper says make Palo Alto worth calling home.

When has Best of Palo Alto run, and when does voting open?

Edition history

The awards have run every year from 2018 through 2026, and the live ballot pages for the 2024, 2025 and 2026 cycles all sat at the same Palo Alto Online address. The paper's own description labels the programme annual, so the expectation each summer is a fresh edition rather than a one-off event.

The shape of a cycle

Voting falls between June and August, after which the paper shifts into its results phase. That is where the programme stands for 2026: the winners are posted, backed by more than 13,500 reader votes, and the paper's write-up notes that the list pairs "longtime favorites and exciting newcomers."

What the programme does not put in print is its precise calendar. Neither the awards pages nor the ballot announces the day nominations open, the day voting starts or the day results post, so confirm on the live ballot each cycle.

How do you cast a ballot in Best of Palo Alto?

Filling out the ballot

To take part, open the Best Of section of Palo Alto Online during the summer stretch and work through the category list, which spans restaurants, shops, service providers and local businesses. Mark the business you prefer in each category where you hold a real opinion, then submit the finished form. The paper states its ground rule plainly: "Only one ballot per person is allowed."

Making that single submission count

Because one filing is the entire allowance, the sensible approach is a deliberate pass rather than a rushed click-through. Scan every category before you start; many readers find businesses they want to recognize well beyond the restaurants they already frequent. Nothing on the programme's pages says a half-finished form can be saved and resumed, so plan to complete it in one sitting.

Once a cycle closes, the paper handles the rest: it tallies the reader input, writes up the winners and posts the outcome in the same Best Of section. Supporters who miss the summer stretch simply wait for the next edition rather than hunting for an off-season way in.

How does Best of Palo Alto compare with other California reader votes?

Best of Palo Alto sits inside a wider family of California reader-vote programmes covered in related pages here. Its nearest neighbours include Best of Silicon Valley, Best of Marin, Best of Orange County, Best of Central Valley Business and the 2024 GGBR Calendar Contest.

Scale of place is the clearest divider: this programme covers a single city, while most of the family names carry county or regional footprints. Another divider is the publishing arrangement, a dedicated community newspaper that owns the ballot, wraps it in editorial coverage and reports the outcome, giving the results a local-news setting the bigger regional ballots do not always provide.

For a business weighing where effort pays, the practical consequence is focus. A Palo Alto establishment competes within its own city's field, and the supporters who can back it are the people who actually eat, shop and hire there.

How can a local business earn more support in Best of Palo Alto?

The organizing rule shapes every campaign here: the paper allows one ballot per reader, so stacking repeat attempts onto the same few people achieves nothing. What moves the outcome is distinct supporters. A business that wants a strong showing reaches its own customers during the June-to-August stretch, asks plainly for their backing, and points them toward the categories where it genuinely fits.

Keep the appeal honest and specific, because the ballot rewards sincere local opinion rather than volume funnelled through a handful of households. Tactics that travel well across community awards, from email reminders to counter-side signage, are collected in our guide to earning more votes online. If paid promotion enters the picture, the paper's one-ballot ceiling still governs what any campaign can do, and the legal background sits in our guide on whether buying votes is legal.