Tempe, Maricopa County, Arizona, USA

Tempe is an inner suburb of Phoenix on the Salt River, with Tempe Butte and Tempe Town Lake among its best-known landmarks. Its dense urban core sits within the Sonoran Desert, where canals have supported settlement and agriculture for centuries. Modern Tempe grew around Hayden’s Ferry in the 1870s, took its name in 1879 and became home to the Territorial Normal School, now Arizona State University, in 1885. The city had about 190,600 residents in 2025. Higher education, technology, finance, tourism, arts and the restaurants and shops around Mill Avenue give Tempe a lively metropolitan character.