The allied victory at Red Cliffs ensured the survival of Liu Bei and Sun Quan and left them in control of the Yangtze, establishing defensible frontiers that would later serve as the basis for the states of Shu Han and Eastern Wu during the Three Kingdoms period (220–280).

In the winter of 207 he secured his northern flank by defeating the Wuhuan people at the Battle of White Wolf Mountain.

Liu Biao, the governor of Jing, controlled the Yangtze west of the Han River's mouth, which roughly encompassed the territory around the city of Xiakou and to the south.

Liu Bei was surrounded and decisively defeated at the Battle of Changban but escaped eastward to Xiakou, where he liaised with Sun Quan's emissary Lu Su.

Historical accounts are inconsistent: Lu Su may have successfully encouraged Liu Bei to move further east to Fankou (樊口, near present-day Ezhou, Hubei).

Zhuge Liang was supported by Lu Su and Zhou Yu, Sun Quan's chief commander.

"[21] Zhou Yu, Cheng Pu, and Lu Su were assigned 30,000 men and sent to aid Liu Bei.

As Huang Gai's "defecting" squadron approached the mid-point of the river, the sailors applied fire to the ships before they took to small boats.

[33] Following the initial shock, Zhou Yu and the allies led a lightly armed force to capitalise on the assault.

However, the crossing of the Yangtze River had dissolved into chaos as the allied armies converged on the riverbank and fought over the limited number of ferries.

To restore order, a detachment led by Sun Quan's general Gan Ning established a bridgehead in Yiling to the north, and only a staunch rearguard action by Cao Ren prevented a further catastrophe.

[40] Liu Qi was appointed Inspector of Jing Province, but his rule in the region, centred at Jiangxia Commandery, was short-lived.

Sun Quan's troops had suffered far greater casualties than Liu Bei's in the extended conflict against Cao Ren following the Battle of Red Cliffs, and the death of Zhou Yu in 210 resulted in a drastic weakening of Sun Quan's strength in Jing Province.

[42] The Battle of Red Cliffs and the capture of Jing Province by Liu Bei confirmed the separation of southern China from the northern heartland of the Yellow River valley and foreshadowed a north–south axis of hostility that would continue for centuries.

[43] The precise location of the Red Cliffs battlefield has never been conclusively established, and has long been the subject of both popular and academic debate.

According to Zhang, many of the current debates stem from the fact that the course and length of the Yangtze between Wuli and Wuhan has changed since the Sui and Tang dynasties.

[48] Puqi (蒲圻), one of the candidate sites, was renamed "Chibi City" in 1998,[49] in an attempt to spur local tourism.

Historical accounts also establish eastern and western boundaries for a stretch of the Yangtze that encompasses all of the possible sites for the battlefield.

Since the Yangtze flows roughly eastward towards the ocean with northeast and southeast meanders, Red Cliffs must at least be west of Fankou, which is farther downstream.

[52] This conjecture arises largely from the famous 11th-century poem "First Ode on the Red Cliffs", which presents the Huangzhou hill as the location where the battle took place.

[55] Some sources mention the southern banks of the Yangtze in Jiayu County (嘉鱼县) in the prefecture-level city of Xianning in Hubei as a possible location.

[58] The local topography narrows the width of the Yangtze by a substantial margin, and the Wuhan area was strategically important.

[60] In particular, the 5th-century provincial history Jingzhou ji (荊州記) by Sheng Hongzhi [zh] places the battlefield 160 li (approx.

80 km or 50 mi) downstream from Wulin, but since the Paizhou and Lukou meanders grew at some point during the Sui and Tang dynasties, the length of the Yangtze between Wuli and Wuchang increased by 100 li (approx.

While exiled to Huangzhou (黃州; now Huanggang, Hubei), he composed three widely anthologised pieces on the Red Cliff motif:[62] two fu rhapsodies and one ci lyric.

[65] The 2008 film Red Cliff,[66] directed by Hong Kong filmmaker John Woo, is an adaption of the folk history surrounding the battle.

[67] Upon its release in China, Red Cliff set a new box office record for a domestically produced film.