Jupiter is the northernmost town in Palm Beach County, Florida, United States. According to the 2020 Census, the town had a population of 61,047 as of April 1, 2020. It is 87 miles north of Miami, and the northernmost community in the Miami metropolitan area, home to 6,012,331 people in a 2015 Census Bureau estimate. Jupiter was rated as the 12th Best Beach Town in the United States by WalletHub in 2018, and as the 9th Happiest Seaside Town in the United States by Coastal Living in 2012.
The area where the town now sits was originally named for the Hobe Indian tribe which lived at the mouth of the Loxahatchee River and whose name is also preserved in the name of nearby Hobe Sound. A mapmaker misunderstood the Spanish spelling Jobe of the native people name Hobe and recorded it as Jove. Subsequent mapmakers further misunderstood this to be the name of the Roman god also known as Jupiter, and they adopted the more familiar name of Jupiter. The god Jupiter (or Zeus in Greek mythology) is the chief Roman god, and the god of light, the sky and weather, and of the state and its welfare and laws. Jupiter's consort was Juno, inspiring a neighboring town to name itself Juno Beach. The most notable landmark is the Jupiter Inlet Lighthouse, completed in 1860. Made of brick, it was painted red in 1910 to cover discoloration caused by humidity. Hurricane Jeanne in 2004 sandblasted the paint from the upper portion of the tower, and the tower was repainted using a potassium silicate mineral coating. The lighthouse is often used as the symbol for Jupiter.