Jiangnan is a geographic region in East China, not a single city. The name refers to the lands immediately south of the lower reaches of the Yangtze River, including the southern part of the river's delta. It is a cultural and historical region rather than an administrative unit, and it has no single municipal government or capital.
The region covers a substantial area of eastern China. It encompasses Shanghai, the southeastern parts of Jiangsu and Anhui provinces, a small portion of northeastern Jiangxi, and Zhejiang Province. Because it spans several provincial-level jurisdictions, Jiangnan is defined by geography and shared cultural associations rather than by fixed borders.
Several major cities lie within Jiangnan, among them Ningbo, Anqing, Changzhou, Hangzhou, Shaoxing, Suzhou, Wuxi, and Wenzhou. These urban centres are distributed across the provinces and municipality that make up the region, reflecting its extent along the lower Yangtze and the surrounding delta.