After a shakedown cruise in the Caribbean, San Jacinto joined the Pacific Fleet in time to take part in the June 1944 Marianas operation and in the Battle of the Philippine Sea.
Over the summer, her planes struck targets in the Palaus, the Bonins and the Carolines. During October 1944, San Jacinto participated in raids on Okinawa, Formosa and the Philippines and in the Battle of Leyte Gulf. Following that great naval battle, she was part of the task groups that continued the Western Pacific offensive with attacks on targets in the Philippines, Formosa and around the South China Sea.
In February and March 1945, San Jacinto's planes raided the Japanese Home Islands on two occasions and assisted with the invasions of Iwo Jima and Okinawa. Remaining off the latter island over much of the next three months, she battled suicide planes and helped destroy the final Japanese surface warship attack of the Pacific War. San Jacinto again struck targets in Japan during July and operated in the area through the last days of the Second World War.
San Jacinto returned to the United States in mid-September 1945. Generally inactive thereafter, she was decommissioned at San Diego, California, in March 1947. While laid up in the Reserve Fleet in May 1959, the carrier was reclassified as an aircraft transport and given the new hull number AVT-5. Following over two decades in "mothballs", USS San Jacinto was sold for scrapping in December 1971.
