Where Is Euphoria Set?

If you can't get enough of "Euphoria," you aren't alone. The show's second season premiere made HBO history by bringing in nine times as many viewers as the pilot episode. People showed up in droves to find out what Rue, Jules, and everyone else in East Highland would be getting themselves into next. That season ended with a pretty massive cliffhanger, and even though some of the show's stars like Jacob Elordi have dropped hints about "Euphoria" season 3, everyone's still waiting for some resolution.

There's no better way for "Euphoria" fans to pass the time than by watching the entire show all over again. On a second viewing, there are all sorts of small details that are bound to jump out at you. Part of the appeal of "Euphoria" is that it takes place in a town that could be just about anywhere, but when you start noticing certain bits of the scenery, it becomes pretty obvious that the setting is more specific than the show lets on. We've done the heavy lifting for you and found out where "Euphoria" is supposed to take place, and how its filming locations have a real impact on that setting.

"Euphoria" has a grounded story, but that doesn't mean the show takes place somewhere real. "Euphoria" is set in a fictional town called East Highland, and the characters all attend the equally fictional East Highland High School. The show never comes right out and says where East Highland is located, but we can use context clues to infer that the town must be somewhere in southern California.

If you're familiar with Los Angeles, you might have recognized a handful of locations shown in "Euphoria," but even without that background knowledge, it's fairly easy to guess where East Highland must be. The biggest clue is the complete lack of snow or winter weather, which is particularly noticeable in Season 2. That season takes place through the middle of a school year, so we'd expect to see Rue and her friends trudging through snow occasionally if they lived somewhere with big seasonal changes. Aside from the lack of winter preparation, we can also tell that "Euphoria" must be set somewhere along the coast thanks to the special episode, "F*** Anyone Who's Not a Sea Blob," where there's a scene with Jules standing on the beach. Those clues are pretty definitive, but we can also look to where the show is actually filmed for more evidence that East Highland must be in California.

"Euphoria" was actually filmed in California, and plenty of the show's scenes were shot on location. Take the shop that Fez and Ashtray work at and use as a front for their own drug sales, for example. It's actually a real Temple City called Alta Dena Dairy, though the show changed the branding on the outside of the store. East Highland High School is another genuine location, but in the real world it's called Ulysses S. Grant High School. The school's frequently been used by film productions, and you can see shots of it in other shows like "Malcolm in the Middle" and "Freaks and Geeks."

Of course, not every location in "Euphoria" has a real life counterpart. Like any other TV show, plenty of the scenes are filmed on soundstages. Sometimes shows build sets to get around the problems with scheduling and logistics that can come up when using a real location, but other times sets are needed to create certain effects. The famous shot of the world spinning around Rue after she takes drugs in the show's pilot episode was created with a ridiculously elaborate set that had the entire room set on a gimbal, which deserves some recognition for being a movie-quality practical effect that most people would guess is CGI. You just can't get that kind of effect in a real-world location, but "Euphoria" effortlessly blends all its filming locales together into a cohesive universe.