List of Famous people born in San José, Costa Rica

Mario José Echandi Jiménez was the 33rd President of Costa Rica, serving from 1958 to 1962.

Franklin Ramón Chang-Díaz is a Costa Rican-born American mechanical engineer, physicist and former NASA astronaut. He is the sole founder and CEO of Ad Astra Rocket Company as well as a member of Cummins' board of directors. He became an American citizen in 1977.

Lorena Clare Facio is the former First Lady of Costa Rica and wife of former President Miguel Ángel Rodríguez Echeverría.

Abel Pacheco de la Espriella was president of Costa Rica between 2002 and 2006, representing the Social Christian Unity Party (Partido Unidad Social Cristiana – PUSC). He ran on a platform to continue free market reforms and to institute an austerity program, and was elected, in a second electoral round, with 58% of the vote in April 2002.

Ruby O. Fee, is a German actress.

Alejandro Tadeo Ramírez Álvarez is a Costa Rican-born American chess player. At the age of 15, he became the first Central American to achieve the title of Grandmaster and the second youngest chess grandmaster in the world at the time.

Juan Mora Fernández was Costa Rica's first elected head of state. He was considered a liberal and decided to move the capital from Cartago to Puntarenas. Juan Mora was elected as the first head of state in 1825. He is remembered for instituting land reform, and he followed a progressive course. As a consequence of his land reform structure, he inadvertently created an elite class of powerful coffee barons. The barons eventually overthrew one of his later successors, José María Alfaro Zamora.