Italy is a boot-shaped peninsula in southern Europe that reaches into the centre of the Mediterranean, covering about 301,300 km² (116,300 sq mi) with nearly 59 million inhabitants. On a map it splits into five physical regions: the arc of the Alps along the northern border, the flat Po Valley beneath them, the Apennine chain running about 1,350 km down the peninsula, the volcanic south around Naples and Sicily, and the two big islands of Sicily and Sardinia. The highest point is Mont Blanc on the French border, at about 4,807 m; the lowest is Jolanda di Savoia near Ferrara, 3.44 m below sea level. The Po (652 km) is the longest river, followed by the Adige (410 km) and the Tiber (405 km), which flows through Rome. By surface type, hills cover 41.6% of the country, mountains 35.2% and plains only 23.2%.
Italy shares land borders with four countries: Switzerland (698 km), France (476 km), Austria (404 km) and Slovenia (218 km). Two independent states sit entirely inside it, San Marino and Vatican City. The mainland and islands together have about 7,900 km of coast, and the country stretches 1,291 km in a straight line from its northernmost point in South Tyrol to Punta Pesce Spada on Lampedusa, an island that geologically belongs to Africa.
The Italian Alps: Mont Blanc, Monte Rosa and the Dolomites
The Alps run for about 1,000 km along Italy's northern edge, bending in a wide arc from the Ligurian coast near the French border to the Julian Alps above Trieste. The western section holds the country's highest peaks, with numerous summits above 4,000 m. Mont Blanc (Monte Bianco) rises between the Aosta Valley and France, and the line across its summit is still disputed: Italy says the border follows the watershed and splits the top between the two countries, while France puts the summit wholly on its side. Further east stand Monte Rosa (4,634 m) and the Matterhorn, called Cervino in Italian (4,478 m), both on the Swiss border.
East of Lake Como the Alps change character. The Bernina group and the Stelvio pass lead into the Dolomites, a range of pale carbonate towers in Veneto, Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol and Friuli-Venezia Giulia, bounded by the Adige in the west and the Piave in the east. The rock, and the range, take their name from the French mineralogist Déodat de Dolomieu (1750–1801), who first described the mineral dolomite. UNESCO listed the Dolomites as a World Heritage Site on 26 June 2009. Their best-known shape is the Tre Cime di Lavaredo, three battlement-like peaks at the head of the Rienz valley in the Sexten Dolomites. Our guide to the Dolomites covers their peaks and passes in detail.
On their southern side the Alps drop to a belt of long, deep lakes carved by Ice Age glaciers and dammed by their moraines. Lake Garda is the largest in Italy at 370 km². Lake Maggiore (212.5 km²) extends north into Switzerland, and Lake Como, at 146 km², holds the national depth record of 410 m. The Alps also explain an oddity of Italian drainage: a few border valleys do not flow to the Mediterranean at all. Livigno drains through the Inn and Innichen through the Drava, both Danube tributaries bound for the Black Sea, while the Lago di Lei drains into the Rhine and the North Sea.
The Po Valley: Italy's 46,000 km² Plain
Between the Alps and the northern Apennines lies the only large lowland in the country. The Po Valley covers about 46,000 km², which is more than 70% of all the flat land in Italy. Its river rises at Pian del Re beneath Monviso in the Cottian Alps and runs east roughly along the 45th parallel for 652 km, past Turin, Piacenza, Cremona and Ferrara. It drains a basin of 74,000 km², and with the Rhône and the Nile it is one of the three Mediterranean rivers with the largest discharge.
Geographers split the plain into two bands. The high plain, close to the Alpine and Apennine foothills, is built of coarse gravel washed down from the mountains. The low plain in the centre is fine silt laid down by the river itself, and it runs out into the Po delta south of Venice, where five main channels (Po di Maestra, Po della Pila, Po delle Tolle, Po di Gnocca and Po di Goro) and hundreds of smaller ones reach the Adriatic. Much of this lowland was reclaimed from marsh, which is why Italy's lowest point lies here, below sea level, at Jolanda di Savoia. North of the delta the Venetian Lagoon, about 550 km² of shallow salt water between the Sile and Brenta rivers, holds Venice, while the Adige, Italy's second-longest river, comes down from Lake Resia to reach the sea at Chioggia.
The Apennines, from the Cadibona Pass to Aspromonte
The Apennines begin where the Alps end, at the Colle di Cadibona in Liguria, and run the full length of the peninsula into Calabria before continuing across the Strait of Messina into northern Sicily, where they end in the Madonie. They are much younger than the Alps, formed during the Oligocene, and they act as the peninsula's watershed: rain falling on their western slopes reaches the Tyrrhenian Sea, and rain on their eastern slopes reaches the Adriatic or the Ionian. Because the divide sits so close to both coasts, peninsular rivers are short. The Tiber is the exception, rising on Monte Fumaiolo and flowing 405 km to the Tyrrhenian through Rome. The Arno, which crosses Florence and Pisa, and the Volturno in Campania also drain west.
The chain reaches its greatest height in Abruzzo. The Gran Sasso d'Italia massif rises to 2,912 m at Corno Grande, the highest summit in the Apennines, and beneath it lies the Calderone glacier, which has shrunk so much that its remaining ice bodies could disappear entirely by 2050.
Hill country lines both flanks of the chain. On the Tyrrhenian side the Anti-Apennine runs from the Colline Metallifere of Tuscany to the Campanian hills. On the Adriatic side the hills widen into Apulia's Murge and the Gargano, the limestone promontory that forms the spur of the boot, topped by Monte Calvo at 1,065 m. Further south the chain narrows into the Calabrian massifs, ending in Aspromonte above the Strait of Messina. Apulia also holds the Tavoliere delle Puglie, Italy's second-largest plain, which formed when the seabed was lifted, unlike the Po Valley, which rivers built up.
Volcanic Italy: Vesuvius, the Phlegraean Fields and Etna
Italy sits where the African Plate presses against the Eurasian Plate. That collision makes it the most earthquake-prone country in Europe and gives it four active volcanoes. Vesuvius stands about 9 km east of Naples. Its eruption in 79 AD buried Pompeii and Herculaneum, and it remains the only volcano on the European mainland to have erupted in the last hundred years, with roughly 3 million people living close enough to be affected. West of Naples the Campi Flegrei (Phlegraean Fields) form a wide caldera, and the islands of Ischia and Procida in the bay are volcanic too.
Further south, off the north coast of Sicily, the seven Aeolian Islands form a volcanic arc. Stromboli, a cone still in eruption, and Vulcano are the two best known. Hidden under the Tyrrhenian Sea, about 140 km north of Sicily, lies the Marsili seamount, 70 km long and 30 km wide, one of the largest volcanoes in Europe.
Mount Etna, on Sicily's east coast between Catania and Messina, is by far the largest of Italy's four active volcanoes. Its summit stood at 3,403 m in September 2024, making it Italy's tallest peak south of the Alps, though the figure shifts with each summit eruption. It covers 1,190 km², with a base circumference of 140 km, and its slopes carry vineyards and orchards down to the Plain of Catania. UNESCO added it to the World Heritage list in June 2013.
Sicily, Sardinia and the Smaller Islands
Sicily, at 25,707 km², is Italy's largest island and lies only 140 km from Tunisia across the Strait of Sicily. Geologically it continues the Calabrian peninsula, with the Apennine ridge running along its north coast and Etna in the east, while the centre is rolling hill country. Pantelleria sits in the Sicilian Channel, and the Pelagian Islands of Lampedusa, Linosa and Lampione mark Italy's southern limit.
Sardinia (24,090 km²) is a different landscape altogether. Its mountains belong to the Sardinian-Corsican block rather than the Apennines, and their rocks are among the oldest in Europe, dating from the Palaeozoic: schist, limestone and granite worn into smooth shapes. The Gennargentu massif in the provinces of Nuoro and Ogliastra holds the island's highest summit, Punta La Marmora, at 1,834 m, inside the Gennargentu National Park. The Campidano, an alluvial plain, cuts across the island's south-west towards Cagliari, whose lagoon, the Stagno di Cagliari, is one of the few wetlands Italy did not drain. Off the north coast lie Asinara and the La Maddalena archipelago, and the Strait of Bonifacio separates Sardinia from French Corsica.
Between the two big islands and the mainland are dozens of smaller ones. Elba (223 km²), the third-largest Italian island, leads the Tuscan Archipelago with Capraia, Giglio and Montecristo; Capri, Ischia and Procida guard the Gulf of Naples; and the Tremiti Islands rise in the Adriatic.
Five Seas and a Strait Around the Boot
The waters around Italy are named separately, and a map labels six: five seas and the Strait of Sicily. The Ligurian Sea, centred on the Gulf of Genoa, has high, rocky shores on the Riviera di Levante. The Tyrrhenian, between the peninsula, Sicily and Sardinia, has the most broken coastline, with the gulfs of Gaeta, Naples and Salerno and the Sorrento peninsula. The Adriatic coast is mostly low, sandy and straight, broken only by the Conero headland near Ancona and the Gargano. The Ionian washes the instep and sole of the boot around the Gulf of Taranto. The Sea of Sardinia lies west of Sardinia, and the Strait of Sicily lies to the south. The Strait of Messina links the Tyrrhenian and the Ionian, and at the heel the Strait of Otranto separates Capo d'Otranto, Italy's easternmost point, from Albania by just 70 km.
For all that coastline, no inhabited place in Italy is more than 294 km from the sea. The farthest is Madesimo, high in the Alps in the province of Sondrio. That short distance from mountain to coast across the whole country helps explain the climate contrasts mapped in our page on the climate of Italy, and the border crossings through the Alpine passes are traced country by country in the countries that border Italy.