[4] The town is located at the edge of the 12,363 km2 (4,773 sq mi) Southern Patagonian Ice Field and about 350 inhabitants live there throughout all the seasons of the year.

Snow and ice mostly fence the town, and the homes are low structured with roads mostly made of rocks and dirt.

The village provides national park information for visitors, as well as commercial camping grounds and a limited number of beds, catering mostly for backpackers.

El Chaltén has an unpredictable subpolar oceanic climate (Köppen Cfc) with subantarctic continental (Dfc) influences, with precipitation distributed on a large number of days despite not being nearly as heavy as in Chilean Patagonia; bad weather is exceedingly common.

Summers experience long daylight hours, very windy weather, and cool temperatures, mostly below 18 °C (64.4 °F) during the day and below 5 °C (41 °F) during the night.