With its 8 280 km2, it is about 200 km long and 30 to 40 km wide. In 1999, the population of the area reached 1 763 636 inhabitants.

The climatic conditions in Alsace are characterized by a semi-continental climate with rather cold winters (60 to 70 days of frost per year), and warm and dry summers. Precipitations are of 600 to 700 mm per year. The Alsace area is shielded from the western wet winds by to the Vosges Mountain and thus benefits from an important period of sunshine.

The spoken language in the area is a Germanic dialect called in German "Elsässerdeutsch". This dialect has been spoken in Alsace since the 5th century, and is a part of Frankish and Alemannic dialects. Some villages of the Sundgau area have a Romanic dialect. Some villages of the high valleys and the crests on the West of Kaysersberg among which those of the "welche country" (Aubure, le Bonhomme, Lapoutroie, Orbey, Labaroche), the high Valley of Lièpvre, a part of the Valley of Villé, and the high valley of the Bruche (Ban de la Roche and area of Donon) use a dialect from Vosges, which is not Germanic.

The Alsace area includes the Eastern slope of the Vosges, with crystalline massif ("Grand Ballon" or "Ballon de Guebwiller" 1 424 meters high, "Hohneck" 1 361 meters high, and "Ballon d’Alsace" 1 247 meters high), deep valleys (valleys of the Doler, Thur, Fecht, Weiss and Liepvrette). The under-the-Vosges hills are about 500 m high, and planted with vineyards and fruit farming. The plain of Alsace is a ground of loess (wheat, sugar beet, fodder plants, orchards, hop fields, tobacco...) and alternate with “rieds” or low wet plains behind the alluvial lifting of the Rhine.