Other major cities are Freiburg im Breisgau, Heidelberg, Heilbronn, Konstanz, Pforzheim, Reutlingen, Tübingen, and Ulm.

The sobriquet Ländle, a diminutive of the word Land in the local Swabian, Alemannic and Franconian dialects, is sometimes used as a synonym for Baden-Württemberg.

[14] Baden spans along the flat right bank of the river Rhine from north-west to the south (Lake Constance) of the present state, whereas Württemberg and Hohenzollern lay more inland and hillier, including areas such as the Swabian Jura mountain range.

The majority of people in this region continued to be Roman Catholics, even after the Protestant Reformation influenced populations in northern Germany.

In the late 18th and early 19th century, Künzelsau, the capital of the Hohenlohe district, became the centre of emigration to the UK of pork butchers and bacon factors.

The pioneers noticed a niche for speciality pork products in the rapidly growing English cities, especially those in the industrial centre and North.

[15] In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, numerous people emigrated from this primarily rural area to the United States for economic reasons.

After World War II, the Allies established three states in the territory of modern-day Baden-Württemberg: (South) Baden,[h] Württemberg-Baden[i] and Württemberg-Hohenzollern.

[7] Most of the major cities of Baden-Württemberg straddle the banks of the Neckar River, which has its source in Villingen-Schwenningen and runs downstream (from southwest to the centre, then northwest) through the state past Tübingen, Stuttgart, Heilbronn, Heidelberg, and Mannheim.

The Black Forest (Schwarzwald), the central mountain range of the state, rises east of the Upper Rhine valley.

Baden-Württemberg shares Lake Constance (Bodensee, also known regionally as the Swabian Sea) with Switzerland, Austria and Bavaria, the international borders within its waters not being clearly defined.

Due to the differences of the landscapes, average annual temperatures reach from only 5 °C (41 °F) in the microclimates of Black Forest and Allgäu up to 13 °C (55 °F) in the Upper Rhine Valley.

The politics of Baden-Württemberg have traditionally been dominated by the conservative Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), which had led all but one government since 1952 until 2011.

[22] Apart from the city-states of Berlin, Bremen and Hamburg, Baden-Württemberg offers the fourth-shortest routes to trains and buses on average among all German states.

[33] If Baden-Württemberg were a sovereign country (2020), it would have an economy comparable to that of Sweden in terms of nominal gross domestic product (GDP).

[34] A number of well-known enterprises are headquartered in the state, for example Mercedes-Benz Group, Porsche, Robert Bosch GmbH (automobile industry), Carl Zeiss AG (optics), SAP (Europe's most valuable brand[35] as well as the largest non-American software enterprise) and Heidelberger Druckmaschinen (precision mechanical engineering).

Although poor in workable natural resources (formerly lead, zinc, iron, silver, copper, and salts) and still very rural in some areas, the region is heavily industrialised overall.

Main sights include the capital and biggest city, Stuttgart, modern and historical at the same time, with its urban architecture and atmosphere (and famously, its inner-city parks and historic Wilhelma zoo), its castles (such as Castle Solitude), its museums as well as a rich cultural programme (theatre, opera) and mineral spring baths in Bad Cannstatt (also the site of a Roman Castra); it is the only major city in Germany with vineyards in an urban territory.

Baden-Württemberg also boasts rich old Free Imperial Cities such as Biberach, Esslingen am Neckar, Heilbronn, Ravensburg, Reutlingen, Künzelsau, Schwäbisch Hall and Aalen as well as the southernmost and sunniest city of Germany, Freiburg, close to Alsace and Switzerland, being an ideal base for exploring the heights of the nearby Black Forest (e.g., for skiing in winter or for hiking in summer) with its traditional villages and the surrounding wine country of the Rhine Valley of South Baden.

[14] The countryside of the lush Upper Neckar valley (where Rottweil is famous for its Fastnacht carnival) and the pristine Danube valley Swabian Alb (with Hohenzollern Castle and Sigmaringen Castle), as well as the largely pristine Swabian Forest, the Upper Rhine Valley, and Lake Constance, where all kinds of water sports are popular, with the former Imperial, today border town of Konstanz (where the Council of Constance took place), the Neolithic and Bronze Age village at Unteruhldingen, the flower island of Mainau, and the hometown of the Zeppelin, Friedrichshafen a.o., are especially popular for outdoor activities in the summer months.

Furthermore, there are more than a dozen Fachhochschulen, i.e., universities of applied sciences, as well as Pädagogische Hochschulen, i.e., teacher training colleges, and other institutions of tertiary education in Baden-Württemberg.

[49][50] DB Regio, SWEG, HzL, AVG and WEG have been joined in operating regional trains by Abellio, Agilis, Bodensee-Oberschwaben-Bahn, Go-Ahead, SBB, Schwäbische Alb-Bahn and VIAS, which entered the market.

[52] In 1900, the Hohenzollerische Landesbahn (HzL) was founded to expand the rail system in the Prussian province, which had previously only been served by short sections of Württemberg lines passing through "foreign" territory.

[53] A popular TV programme portraying railways around Germany and the world, Eisenbahn-Romantik, originates in Baden-Württemberg and is produced by its public broadcaster SWR.

[55] As of 2023, tram and light rail systems exist in Freiburg, Heidelberg,[n] Heilbronn,[o] Karlsruhe,[p] Mannheim,[q] Stuttgart and Ulm.

[60] Source:[61] Northern and most of central Württemberg has been traditionally Protestant (particularly Lutheran) since the Reformation in 1534 (with its centre at the famous Tübinger Stift).

Handball-Bundesliga multiple champions Frisch Auf Göppingen and Rhein-Neckar Löwen, as well as TVB 1898 Stuttgart are based in Baden-Württemberg.

Several major women's handball clubs are also based here, including 3-time Frauen Bundesliga champions SG BBM Bietigheim.

Compared to other German states, Baden-Württemberg has a particularly high density of professional basketball teams such as Riesen Ludwigsburg, ratiopharm Ulm, USC Heidelberg, PS Karlsruhe Lions and others.

The same or similar Alemannic dialects are also spoken in the neighboring regions, especially in Bavarian Swabia, Alsace (Alsatian), German-speaking Switzerland (Swiss German), and the Austrian Vorarlberg.