Top Gun: San Diego, Miramar and Filming Locations

In the film, Maverick and Goose are sent to the Naval Fighter Weapons School at Naval Air Station Miramar, the Top Gun school. Here they buzz the control tower when specifically told not to, and the stunt drew calls from residents reporting a "berserk pilot". Filming moved to Miramar after Oceanside to shoot the scenes on the aircraft. The Navy's fighter school left in 1996, and the base is now Marine Corps Air Station Miramar, which holds the Miramar Airshow each year on the last weekend of September.

Location precision: Miramar is a large air station; the pin marks the base, not a specific filming spot.

Filming began in Oceanside on 26 June 1985. Paramount rented a Folk Victorian/Queen Anne cottage at 102 North Pacific Street and used it as the home of Charlotte "Charlie" Blackwood, the astrophysicist and civilian Top Gun instructor. The house stood near the pier. In May 2020 it was relocated and renovated into a pie shop called High Pie, now at 250 North Pacific Street.

Visitor guidance: The relocated house is the pie shop at 250 North Pacific Street, Oceanside.

Two scenes were shot at this San Diego bar in July 1985. In the first, Goose and Maverick sit at the piano singing "Great Balls of Fire". The final scene was also filmed here. The restaurant calls itself the "Top Gun Bar". A kitchen fire on 26 June 2008 destroyed much of it.

Visitor guidance: A working restaurant and bar in San Diego's Marina district.

Most of the film's sequences of aircraft maneuvering over land were shot at Naval Air Station Fallon in Nevada, using ground-mounted cameras. The fictitious MiG-28 enemy aircraft was played by the Northrop F-5. In 1996 the Navy moved its fighter weapons school, TOPGUN, from Miramar to Fallon, a premier Navy air-to-air and air-to-ground training facility.

Location precision: The sources say only that the flying scenes were shot over land near NAS Fallon; the pin marks the air station.

Filming of the sequel Top Gun: Maverick officially started on 30 May 2018 in San Diego. Although the real Top Gun school had moved to Fallon in Nevada, the story was set in San Diego at Naval Air Station North Island. The station lies at the north end of the Coronado peninsula on San Diego Bay.

Location precision: The sequel sets its school at North Island as a story choice; the pin marks the air station, not a single scene.