Filipino American History, Culture & Community
Latest from PinoyBuilt
The newest story, front and center — plus what just followed it.
The language of lolo and lola, reclaimed one word at a time — song lyrics, regional tongues, and grammar for Fil-Ams finding their way back.
Learn Filipino
Word studies built on OPM, regional languages, and grammar — for Fil-Ams reconnecting with the language of their lolo and lola. Language is identity.
- Language Is Identity: Why Every Fil-Am Family Must Keep Filipino Alive
- MULTO teaches pagharap — the courage to face what haunts us
- Bawat Daan teaches tahanan — the word for home that means more than a house
- Maganda, Magayon, and the Word for Beautiful That Named a Volcano
The generation being raised on this side of the ocean — and what it looks like to grow up Filipino in a California high school gym on a Friday night.
Kabataan
Games, proms, graduations, and the college Filipino clubs waiting a few years down the road. Shot from the bleachers by somebody's dad.
More kabataan →The people you keep showing up for. Class reunions, backyard parties, and the friendships that outlasted the school that made them.
Barkada
Hogan Spartans who scattered across three decades and still answer the group text. The reunions, the get-togethers, the ones who flew in, and the ones we lost along the way.
More barkada stories →Who is holding the diaspora up — the organizers, the caregivers, the volunteers, and the people who show up when nobody is counting.
Community Profiles
Organizers, veterans, artists, nurses, and neighbors — the people and organizations holding up Filipino America.
More community coverage →Where in America we actually live — county by county, then state by state, then the countries the family scattered to. Some of these places are here because the diaspora is thickest there. One is here because it is home.
Places
Filipino life photographed place by place — the parties, the parishes, the storefronts, and the airports we keep meeting each other in.
California, county by county
California holds roughly 38% of all Filipino Americans — more than any country outside the Philippines and the United States. It does not spread evenly. It clusters.
Orange County
Alameda County
Santa Clara County
Sacramento County
County population figures: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 5-Year Estimates, as published on the PinoyBuilt California pillar (reviewed 8/11/2026). Santa Clara and Sacramento are carried here for archive coverage; no county-level figure is published for them on that page.
Across the United States
Filipino Americans live in all fifty states. After California, these are the four this archive keeps returning to.
State population figures: U.S. Census Bureau ACS (2023) and Pew Research Center (2024), as published on the PinoyBuilt USA pillar (reviewed 8/13/2026).
Beyond the United States
The diaspora did not stop at one country. Neither did the family.
Australia
United Arab Emirates
Each place runs on its own label. Tag a post with the place and it lands here on the next load. The Philippines has its own section — see Balikbayan.
Explore by Region
Filipino America, place by place. Each guide is a standing pillar page, not a news post.
Filipino Americans in USA
An estimated 4.6 million residents of Filipino descent — the third-largest Asian American group and the largest population of overseas Filipinos anywhere in the world.
Filipino Americans in California
1.7 million residents of Filipino descent — more than any other state, and more than any country outside the Philippines and the U.S. itself.
Filipino Americans in Hawaii
125,000 Sakadas built this state — from the SS Doric to the Hanapepe Massacre to the ILWU to Bruno Mars.
Filipino Americans in Texas
232,000 Filipino Americans and growing fast — now the third-largest home for Filipinos in the United States.
Population figures are sourced and dated on each regional guide.
Where we come from, what was taken, and what we still carry. This is the spine everything else on the site leans against.
Decolonization
Reclaiming pre-colonial identity, language, and history — the throughline of everything PinoyBuilt publishes.
More decolonization coverage →Pre-colonial Philippines, the Philippine-American War, the manong generation, and the labor history that built two countries.
History
Pre-colonial Philippines, the Philippine-American War, the manong generation, and the labor history that built two countries.
More history →On This Day
From fifteen years of the PinoyBuilt archive — what we published, remembered, or marked on this date.
Footage from the PinoyBuilt channel — and the occasional piece written around someone else's video, always credited to the creator who shot it.
Watch
Fiestas, performances, tournaments, and family footage that a photograph could not hold. Some of it has been sitting on a hard drive for fifteen years.
More video →Going home to the Philippines, photographed. Kept for the ones who were too young at the time to remember any of it.
Balikbayan
The wedding in 1999. The vacations. The reunions where nobody could agree on the restaurant. Landing at NAIA with taped-up boxes and a list of people to see — and the long flight back with a different list.
The Philippines, region by region
Not one country in the photographs — several. The city we left, the capital we passed through, the provinces, and the islands the family married into.
Marikina
Metro Manila
Luzon
Mindanao
Each region runs on its own label. Tag a post with the region and it lands here on the next load.
More balikbayan stories →Our primary format. Weddings, reunions, protests, fiestas, and ordinary Tuesdays — Filipino American life told frame by frame, and kept.
Photo Essays
Documentary photography from the diaspora and the homeland, published as dated, permanent entries in the archive.
More photo essays →Trips that built the brand and trips still being lived — Maui to Dubai to wherever the kids send the next photo from. Every stamp is part of the archive.
Travel
From the 2011 Maui trip that gave PinoyBuilt its name to the Dubai chapters and the kids' journeys we're documenting as they happen — photos, video, and the stories behind them.
What Fil-Am families need to navigate the UC system, campus by campus.
UC & U.S. Admissions
Campus-by-campus guides for Fil-Am families navigating the UC system — application counts, deadlines, and the Filipino student organizations waiting on the other side.
- UC Acceptance Season: A Filipino American Family Guide
- UC Davis received 122,271 applications for Fall 2026
- UC Irvine received 153,025 applications for Fall 2026
- UC Santa Cruz sets a record with 90,867 applications
Policy and lived reality for OFWs, balikbayans, petitioners, and the families waiting on both ends of a case number.
Immigration & OFW
Policy and lived reality for OFWs, balikbayans, petitioners, and the families waiting on both ends of a case number.
More immigration coverage →Filipino creativity on the screen, on the stage, in music, and across the arts — from BINI, H.E.R., and Bruno Mars to OPM, Philippine mythology, and the stories shaping how the world sees Filipinos.
Entertainment & Culture
Screen, stage, music, and the arts — Filipino creativity shaping how the world sees us.
More entertainment & culture →Filipino athletic excellence on the world stage — the matches, the milestones, and the flag carried across every court and field.
Sports
From Alex Eala's tour arc to the Filipino and Filipino-American athletes making their mark — every match, milestone, ranking, and breakthrough.
More sports coverage →Health through a Filipino American lens — the conditions that hit our families hardest.
Kalusugan
Health through a Filipino American lens — diabetes, hypertension, kidney disease, sleep apnea, and the conditions that hit our families hardest.
When the Bato Breaks: Diabetic Kidney Disease and the Filipino-American Silent Crisis
The first piece in the Kalusugan series — diabetes, blood pressure, and the kidney disease that follows them through Filipino American families.
Recently Published
Browse the full archive →4.6 million Filipinos in the U.S. One platform telling our stories. Salamat, kababayan.
