Solano Avenue in Berkeley and Albany, California is a two-mile (3.2 km) long east-west street. Solano Avenue is one of the larger shopping districts in the Berkeley area. Businesses along Solano Avenue cover a wide range, including grocery stores, coffee shops, drugstores, bookstores, antique dealers, apparel outlets, ethnic restaurants and a movie theater.

Solano Avenue begins, at its western end, on the southern slope of Albany Hill, next to the I-80/I-580 interchange and Union Pacific railroad tracks. The Albany Hill segment of the street is primarily residential and somewhat steep, climbing 86 feet (26 m) in the first three blocks.

At San Pablo Avenue, Solano bends slightly to the south; this is the start of the shopping district. Solano Avenue serves as the de facto Main Street of Albany, and initially, this was in fact its name within the city of Albany. Solano passes under the elevated BART tracks at Masonic Avenue. For four and a half blocks, starting half a block after Curtis Street, the northern side of Solano is in Berkeley, while the southern side and the street itself are in Albany. Between the Albany city limits and The Alameda, Solano Avenue is the main shopping area of Berkeley's Thousand Oaks neighborhood. Landmarks along this segment of the street include the Oaks Theater, a movie palace built in 1925, which has recently closed down, and the first Andronico's grocery store, formerly known as "Andronico's Park and Shop" (for a time, simply "Park and Shop").

After crossing The Alameda, Solano Avenue continues eastward to the Northbrae Tunnel. This tunnel was constructed by the Southern Pacific for its Shattuck Avenue line suburban trains. The Shattuck line met the California Street and Ninth Street lines at the "Colusa Wye" (see Wye (rail)), roughly occupying the area just west of where Andronico's is situated and extending into the block west of Colusa. This terminus for the three lines was also known as "Thousand Oaks Station". After the SP abandoned its commuter lines in 1941, its tracks along Solano were removed, but the right-of-way east of the Alameda was subsequently acquired by the Key System for its F line trains. The Key F-Line railway ran to its terminus at Solano and The Alameda until 1958, when the system was dismantled and the right-of-way east of The Alameda was converted to motor vehicle use (including the F-Line buses of the Key's successor AC Transit), opening on December 15, 1962. Solano Avenue thus passes through the Northbrae Tunnel (constructed in 1911 by the Southern Pacific, and now also referred to as the Solano Ave. Tunnel), which curves to the south. Solano Avenue ends at its intersection with Del Norte and El Dorado Streets just beyond the south portal of the tunnel.

Every year on the second Sunday of September, businesses along Solano Avenue host a street festival called the Solano Avenue Stroll. Founded in 1974/75 by Ira Klein, who managed Berkeley boutique "The Iris", the event initially began on the East end of Solano Avenue as an "open house" of Solano Avenue retail businesses, and eventually included the entire Solano shopping district between San Pablo Avenue in Albany and The Alameda in Berkeley.

During the Stroll, Solano Avenue and all cross streets are closed to traffic. Local businesses and vendors set up booths along both sides of the street and sell clothing, jewelry, art and food items to the public; in recent times, theatre troupes, puppet shows and amusement rides have also been a part of the festival. Various live bands, most local, have played sets at the Stroll, with notable past musicians including RatDog drummer/Primus co-founder Jay Lane (with jam side project Alphabet Soup) and Marc Biedermann (founder of Blind Illusion, and former bassist for thrash metal band Heathen). School jazz, classical and marching bands from Richmond, El Cerrito, Albany and Berkeley have also appeared at the Stroll since its early years.

The event opens with a parade down Solano. As the end of the parade moves downhill, the street is gradually opened to pedestrians only, and stays that way until late in the afternoon. According to a University of California-Berkeley press report, the 2005 event attracted between 120,000 and 150,000 attendees. Around 300,000 people were attributed by organizers to have attended the 2009 festival, a number largely overshadowed by vacant Solano Avenue storefronts and the late 2000s economic downturn.

In 2001, the Solano Stroll was designated a "National Local Legacy" by The Library of Congress.