The federal province Carinthia is Austria´s southern-most province. It is the only one that is located in the south of the main alpine mountain range. In the west it borders on East Tirol, in the north on Salzburg Province and on Styria, in the east on Styria and in the south on Slovenia and Italy.

As Carinthia has an expanse of 9,533 km², it is ranked fifth among the Austrian provinces. Approximately 90,000 of the 550,000 citizens of Carinthia live in Klagenfurt, the provincial capital. The province is divided into the following 8 districts: Feldkirchen, Hermagor, Klagenfurt-Land, St. Veit an der Glan, Spittal an der Drau, Villach-Land, Völkermarkt and Wolfsburg. It is also divided into two cities with their own statutes which are Klagenfurt and Villach as well as into 131 municipalities.

The region Carinthia has deeply fissured rock and is surrounded by mountains: in the west and in the north by the Hohen Tauern mountains and by the Gurktal alps, in the south by the Carnic Alps and the Karawanken mountains and in the east by the Pack and the Koralpe Alps. The main river of Carinthia, the Drau river, runs through the region from the west to the east and divides it into Upper and Lower Carinthia. The most important affluents are: Möll, Lieser, Gail, Gurk and Lavant.

In Carinthia there are 1,270 lakes including the mountain lakes. The largest and most important swimming lakes are the Wörther See lake, the Millstätter See lake, the Ossiacher See lake as well as the Weißensee lake, the Faaker See lake, the Keutschacher See lake and the Klopeiner See lake.
The Hohe Tauern national park and the Nockberge national park as well as the numerous nature reserves which were founded in order to maintain the old cultural areas, the beauty of the landscape and the specialities are also worth mentioning.