[9] Located on the Huron River, Ann Arbor is the principal city of its metropolitan area, which encompasses all of Washtenaw County and had 372,258 residents in 2020.

A college town, Ann Arbor is currently home to the University of Michigan, which significantly shapes the city's economy, employing about 30,000 workers which includes about 12,000 in its medical center.

[26] The town became a regional transportation hub in 1839 with the arrival of the Michigan Central Railroad, and a north–south railway connecting Ann Arbor to Toledo and other markets to the south was established in 1878.

[32] Ann Arbor's Jewish community also grew after the turn of the 20th century, and its first and oldest synagogue, Beth Israel Congregation, was established in 1916.

[33] In 1960, Ann Arbor voters approved a $2.3 million bond issue to build the current city hall, which was designed by architect Alden B. Dow.

The first major meetings of the national left-wing campus group Students for a Democratic Society took place in Ann Arbor in 1960; in 1965, the city was home to the first U.S. teach-in against the Vietnam War.

[36] These influences washed into municipal politics during the early and mid-1970s when three members of the Human Rights Party (HRP) won city council seats on the strength of the student vote.

[38] Since 1998, Ann Arbor is also the home office of the Anthroposophical Society in the United States, an organization dedicated to supporting the community of those interested in the inner path of schooling known as anthroposophy, developed by Rudolf Steiner.

[40] In the past several decades, Ann Arbor has grappled with the effects of sharply rising land values, gentrification, and urban sprawl stretching into outlying countryside.

[43] Ann Arbor consistently ranks in the "top places to live" lists published by various mainstream media outlets every year.

In addition to providing a large pedestrian mall, these changes allow restaurants to use more of the sidewalks and part of the street for outdoor seating.

[47] These changes were popular enough that in 2021 the city council extended the dates from March to November, continuing the schedule of cordoning off cars from Thursday evening until Monday morning.

[54] Ann Arbor is nicknamed "Tree Town", both due to its name and to the dense forestation of its parks and residential areas.

[58] Fuller Recreation Area, near the University Hospital complex, contains sports fields, pedestrian and bike paths, and swimming pools.

[71] The city's commercial districts are composed mostly of two- to four-story structures, although downtown and the area near Briarwood Mall contain a small number of high-rise buildings.

[72] Ann Arbor's residential neighborhoods contain architectural styles ranging from classic 19th- and early 20th-century designs to ranch-style houses.

[73] Ann Arbor has a typically Midwestern humid continental climate (Köppen Dfa), which is influenced by the Great Lakes.

The area experiences lake effect weather, primarily in the form of increased cloudiness during late fall and early winter.

[81] Ann Arbor has a small population of Arab Americans, including students as well as local Lebanese and Palestinians,[82] and a large community of Japanese nationals.

[98] In November 2021, semiconductor test equipment company KLA Corporation opened a new North American headquarters in Ann Arbor.

[108] Another Ann Arbor-based company is Zingerman's Delicatessen, which serves sandwiches and has developed businesses under a variety of brand names.

[109] Avfuel, a global supplier of aviation fuels and services, is headquartered in Ann Arbor[110] as is Pinkerton, a detective and private security firm.

[117] The Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum, an interactive science center, is located in a renovated and expanded historic downtown fire station.

[123] Ann Arbor has a long history of openness to marijuana, given Ann Arbor's decriminalization of cannabis, the large number of medical marijuana dispensaries in the city (one dispensary, called People's Co-op, was directly across the street from Michigan Stadium until zoning forced it to move one mile to the west), the large number of pro-marijuana residents, and the annual Hash Bash: an event that is held on the first Saturday of April.

"[128] Ann Arbor sometimes appears on citation indexes as an author, instead of a location, often with the academic degree MI, a misunderstanding of the abbreviation for Michigan.

[169] The Ann Arbor Chronicle, an online newspaper, covered local news, including meetings of the library board, county commission, and DDA until September 3, 2014.

Until its sign-off on August 31, 2017, WHTV channel 18, a MyNetworkTV-affiliated station for the Lansing market, was broadcast from a transmitter in Lyndon Township, west of Ann Arbor.

The area's other major medical centers include a large facility operated by the Department of Veterans Affairs in Ann Arbor,[179] and Saint Joseph Mercy Hospital in nearby Superior Township.

[185] The Washtenaw County Border-to-Border Trail connects Ann Arbor to Ypsilanti, mostly along the Huron River, for pedestrians, bicycles and other non-motorized transportation.

[186][187] The Ann Arbor Area Transportation Authority (AAATA), which brands itself as "TheRide", operates public bus services throughout the city and nearby Ypsilanti.