The town is located on the Odra Wschodnia, the eastern branch of the Oder river, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) south of Szczecin in Poland.

The western branch of the Oder, 2 km (1 mi) away from the town center, marks the border with Germany.

[4] In 1284 it obtained a permission to build defensive walls[2] and was one of the Pomeranian towns that guaranteed a peace treaty between the Duchy of Pomerania and the Margraviate of Brandenburg.

[5] In 1306 Duke Otto I allowed the town to build a bridge and a dam over the Oder and collect customs duties on it like Szczecin.

[5] In the Thirty Years' War, the town was hit by epidemics in 1625 and 1638, and was occupied by the Holy Roman Empire in 1627–1630 and by Sweden in 1630–1640.

[6] In the final months of World War II, in March 1945, it was captured by Allied Polish and Russian forces.

[7] Afterwards, the region became again part of Poland, although with a Soviet-installed communist regime, which stayed in power until the Fall of Communism in the 1980s.