The highway serves the Appalachia region's Ridge-and-Valley section of East Tennessee, bounded by the Clinch Mountain ridge to the north and the Holston River to the south.

[4] US 11W follows the original pathway of the Great Indian Warpath, a Native American trail used primarily by the Cherokee Nation, which inhabited the Holston River Valley of Tennessee and Virginia.

US 11W heads northeast as Rutledge Pike as a four-lane divided highway that passes by Zoo Knoxville to the west, and then under Interstate 40 (I-40) at exit 392, a partial cloverleaf interchange (parclo).

In John Sevier, US 11W provides accessing the City of Knoxville's police training center, a NS rail yard, and a Cemex concrete plant and quarry.

US 11W exits the city limits of Knoxville near the Poplar Landfill facility, and enters unincorporated east Knox County between the community of Mascot and the Holston River to the south, and House Mountain to the north.

[12] It meets SR 61 (Emory Road) at a signalized intersection and reduces to a two-lane highway exiting the eastern city limits of Blaine at the unincorporated community of Lea Springs.

It meets the Cherokee Lake impoundment of Shields Creek at the intersection of Helton Road, another county-owned collector that accesses SR 375, and the Grainger County Industrial Park.

US 11W/US 25E passes through western Bean Station bounded to the south by Cherokee Lake and a highway-oriented commercial area to the north until reaching Main Street, a former alignment of US 11W.

US 11W heads northeast as Lee Highway again through Bean Station's central business district, where it meets Broadway Drive, a former alignment of US 25E at a signalized intersection.

[16] East of Broadway Drive, US 11W transitions from a four-lane divided highway to a five-lane for the rest of its duration in the city limits/central business area of Bean Station and Grainger County.

In the unincorporated community of Galibrath Springs, US 11W provides access to a silica mining facility at Short Mountain,[18] and several lakefront RV campgrounds.

The highway separates from the Holston River at the community of Lakeview between Short Mountain to the north and Potato Hill to the south and passes through valley farmland.

[20] Exiting Rogersville, US 11W briefly parallels Big Creek around Bunker Hill in Carters Valley through more rolling farmland, before intersecting Carter Valley Road, a county collector route, and the western terminus of SR 346 (Main Street), which directly serves as the main throughfare in Surgoinsville while US 11W bypasses to the north of the town, bounded by forested to the south and farmland to the north.

[22] The highway passes through more farmland, parallels Norfolk Southern's Knoxville East District rail-line, intersects SR 346, and begins an unsigned concurrency with the former as it enters the western city limits of Church Hill.

It passes through forested land and Church Hill's water treatment plant to the south, until reaching an overpass of the Norfolk Southern Knoxville East District rail line.

It is then bordered by Main Street and the Norfolk Southern Knoxville East rail line to the north, and undeveloped forest land owned by the U.S. federal government.

Entering Mount Carmel, the highway has its first major intersection at Englewood Avenue, where accesses residential neighborhoods to the north and a National Guard center to the south.

[25] It soon meets another signalized intersection at Hammond Avenue, which provides access to the main area of Mount Carmel, including its town hall and post office.

It then has two signalized intersections providing access to a Walmart-anchored shopping center and Hunter Wright Stadium, home of the Minor League Baseball Kingsport Axmen, to the north, and the Fort Robinson/Rivermont neighborhood to the south.

East of the interchange, the highway has another signalized intersection at Fairview Avenue, a city collector route, and becomes a six-lane undivided surface arterial road with a continuous left turn lane in the Sevier Terrace neighborhood of North Kingsport.

It then passes the Bloomington Heights neighborhood to the north and Holston Valley Medical Center to the south, which US 11W provides access to the latter to via a signalized intersection at Gibson Mill Road.

[1] US 11W follows Reedy Creek through the hamlet of Mill Point, where the highway intersects the northern end of SR 394, which heads southeast toward the Sullivan County seat of Blountville.

The highways pass DeVault Memorial Stadium, home of the Bristol Pirates, and crosses a rail line at grade before US 11W reaches its northern terminus at Commonwealth Avenue.

[3] This angered many local government and business representatives along US 511 (US 11E), prompting demand from then Tennessee Governor Austin Peay to have US 11 become a divided highway from Knoxville to Bristol.

[43][44] In 1973, following the deadly bus–semitruck collision in Bean Station, the Tennessee Senate and House of Representatives authorized the formation of special joint investigation committee into US 11W's ill-fated past.

[48] The section of US 11W between Blaine and Rutledge has not been planned for widening but studies by TDOT have suggested for the completion of a four-lane US 11W in order to provide safe alternative routes along the I-81/I-40 corridor region for alleviating Interstate congestion on I-40 and I-81.