Hebei province, which surrounds the capital Beijing, covers a total area of 187,700 sq km. The provincial capital Shijiazhuang is 283 km from Beijing in the north. The province adjoins Tianjian and the Bohai Sea in the east and the provinces of Shangdong and Henan in south. It lies along the Taihang Mountains and neighbors Shanxi province in the west, has a common boundary with the Inner Mongolia autonomous region in the north and borders on Liaoning province in the northeast.

Hebei has a continental monsoon climate, with temperatures of -14 to -2°C in January and 20-27 °C in July, and with annual precipitation of 400 to 800 mm, occurring mostly in summer. There are marked changes in all seasons. It has cold and dry winter, hot and rainy summer, transient and windy spring, and cool and agreeable autumn.

The capital is Shijiazhuang. Hebei exercises jurisdiction over the 11 cities of Shijiazhuang, Zhangjiakou, Chengde, Qinhuangdao, Tangshan, Langfang, Baoding, Cangzhou, Hengshui, Xingtai and Handan, 22 county-level cities, 107 counties, 6 autonomous counties and 37 districts.

In 2014, the resident population was 73.8375 million, and the newly born population was 0.9698 million. The natural growth rate was 6.95%.

96% of the population in Hebei is Han people. Mongolian, Man, Hui, Korean, Zhuang, Miao, Tujia, along with other ethnic minorities, accounting for the remaining 4%.