The river rises below Corn Hill on the southwestern slopes of the Victorian Alps, south of Eildon near the town of Woods Point in the Shire of Mansfield.

The Goulburn has 41 tributaries including the Black, Jamieson, Howqua, Delatite, Big, Rubicon, Acheron, Yea, and Broken rivers and the Seven Creeks.

[12] The Goulburn Heritage River was declared in 1992 in recognition of its unique natural, recreational, scenic and cultural values.

In June 2010, the Victorian Government created the Lower Goulburn National Park to protect and enhance the River Red Gum forests in Victoria.

[13] In the upper reaches, there are extensive forests of very tall mountain ash and mixed species and may be described as typical trout streams.

[14] In the Aboriginal Taungurung language, the river has several names: Warring, meaning "big or large water";[2] Bayyango, where Thomas Mitchell noted that this word appeared to be a generic word for river,[7] and (also in the Ngurai-illam Wurrung dialect/language) Omio with no clearly defined meaning.