Hamburg, officially known as the Free and Hanseatic City of Hamburg, is a city-state in northern Germany. It ranks as the second-largest city in Germany following Berlin and is the sixth-largest city in the European Union, with a population exceeding 1.9 million people. The surrounding Hamburg Metropolitan Region has a population of over 5.1 million and represents the tenth-largest metropolitan region by GDP within the European Union.
Geographically, the city is situated at the southern tip of the Jutland Peninsula on the branching River Elbe. It sits at the head of an estuary extending 110 kilometers to the North Sea, located at the confluence of the Alster and Bille rivers. Hamburg is bordered by Schleswig-Holstein to the north and Lower Saxony to the south.
The city is notable for hosting the Port of Hamburg, which serves as Germany's largest port and the third-largest in Europe after Rotterdam and Antwerp. The local dialect spoken in the region is a variant of Low Saxon.