Earlwood is located 10 kilometres south-west of the Sydney central business district, and is part of the Canterbury-Bankstown area.

[citation needed] Frederick Wright Unwin, solicitor and director of the Australasian Sugar Company, obtained land in the Undercliffe area, east of Thorp's property, in 1840, and built his home, which he called Wanstead.

The streets of that subdivision commemorate the names of famous men and battles connected with the war, such as Kitchener, Hamilton, Vimy, Fricourt, Polygon, Thompson, Guedecourt and Flers.

A notable occupant of the area was the Scott family which operated the Scotties tissue factory on the corner of Louisa and River Streets.

[4] Between 1912 and 1957, electric trams operated along Homer Street to Earlwood, providing service to the city via Marrickville and Newtown.

Earlwood has a number of heritage-listed sites, including: The shopping centre is located on Homer Street, 500 metres up the hill from Bardwell Park railway station.

Earlwood has a number of restaurants and cafes scattered amongst the retail outlets, including Greek, Thai and many other European establishments.

Some of the shopping centre buildings, churches and Chelsea Theatre were constructed by the builder William Ernest May formerly of 421 Homer Street.

Earlwood is serviced by a number of bus routes by Transit Systems and U-Go Mobility.

Nearby Marrickville was a major centre of Sydney's Greek community in the 1950s and 1960s, but in the second half of the 20th century most of its Greek residents moved south and west[citation needed] into suburbs like Earlwood, Clemton Park, Bardwell Park, Kingsgrove and Bexley North (all of which have more than 15% of residents reporting Greek ancestry at the 2016 census), which offered larger family homes and blocks of land.

State Government: Earlwood is in the Electoral district of Canterbury in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly.

The suburb of Earlwood stretches in the northeast from the tall escarpment on the south bank of the Cooks River at its junction with Wolli Creek, a locality called Undercliffe.

The Airport & South Line runs along the valley of Wolli Creek in this area, just outside the boundary of Earlwood, and provides the nearest rail access for residents of the suburb.