It runs roughly parallel to the east coast of Australia and forms the fifth-longest land-based mountain chain in the world, and the longest entirely within a single country.

The Great Dividing Range stretches more than 3,500 kilometres (2,175 mi) from Dauan Island in the Torres Strait off the northern tip of Cape York Peninsula, running the entire length of the eastern coastline through Queensland and New South Wales, then turning west across Victoria before finally fading into the Wimmera plains as rolling hills west of the Grampians region.

The highest place in Australia, the 2,228 m (7,310 ft) Mount Kosciuszko, resides in the Snowy Mountains portion of southern Great Dividing Range.

As a rule of thumb, rivers east/southeast of the Dividing Range drain directly eastward into the South Pacific and the Tasman Sea, or southward into the Bass Strait.

The sharp rise between the coastal lowlands and the eastern uplands has affected Australia's climate, mainly due to orographic precipitation, and these areas of highest relief have revealed an impressive gorge country.

[8] In the cool season, the Great Dividing Range would shield much of the southeast (i.e. Sydney, Central Coast, Hunter Valley, Illawarra, the ACT, the Monaro and South Coast) from south-westerly cold fronts that originate from the Southern Ocean, which bring chilling rains, sleet and snow to the upwind side of the ranges, such as on the western Central Tablelands, South West Slopes and Snowy Mountains regions – all which have relatively wetter winters.

[9] Upwind locations include Crookwell, Batlow, Tumut, Corryong, Bright, Beechworth, Eildon, Tolmie and those in West Gippsland (namely the Latrobe Valley and Wilsons Promontory).

Whereas on the downwind (eastern) slopes, Cooma, Omeo, Goulburn, Bowral, Bombala, Nimmitabel, and Canberra, are warmer and drier relative to altitude.

[10] Moreover, Oberon, Shooters Hill and Sunny Corner are on the crest of the ranges and thus exposed from all directions, hence their evenly spread rainfall.

[11] The Great Dividing Range was formed during the Carboniferous period—over 300 million years ago—when Australia collided with what are now parts of South America and New Zealand.

For tens of thousands of years prior to British colonisation the ranges were home to various Aboriginal Australian nations and clans.

Evidence remains in some places of their traditional way of life including decorated caves, campsites and trails used to travel between the coastal and inland regions.

Knowing that local Aboriginal people had already established routes crossing the range and by making use of Aboriginal walking trails, a usable ridge-top route was finally discovered by Europeans directly westward from Sydney across the Blue Mountains to Bathurst by an expedition jointly led by Gregory Blaxland, William Lawson and William Charles Wentworth.

Subsequent explorations were made across and around the ranges by Allan Cunningham, John Oxley, Hamilton Hume, Paul Edmund Strzelecki, Ludwig Leichhardt and Thomas Mitchell.

In some areas, such as the Snowy Mountains, Victorian Alps, the Scenic Rim and the eastern escarpments of the New England region, the highlands form a significant barrier.

Major cities located on the upland areas of the range include Canberra, Toowoomba and the outer suburbs of Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast and Cairns in north Queensland.

The range is also the source of virtually all of eastern Australia's water supply, both through runoff caught in dams, and throughout much of Queensland, through the Great Artesian Basin.

Those that flow south, primarily through Victoria, include the Snowy, Cann, Tambo, Mitchell, Latrobe, Thomson, Yarra, Werribee, Hopkins and Glenelg rivers.