It is located in a coniferous forest on Wytch Heath on the southern shore of Poole Harbour, two miles (3.2 km) north of Corfe Castle.

[2] The earliest industry in the Wytch Farm area dated to the early medieval period and featured multiple salt production workshops.

The workshops, adjacent to the modern oilfield, were part of a medieval salt industry owned by Milton Abbey.

There was a local jetty to export the oil shale, and smaller operations occurred at nearby Bencliff Grit east of Osmington Mills.

[6] The Isle of Purbeck's oil industry began in 1936 with the first unsuccessful and then experimental wells drilled at Broad Bench near Kimmeridge by D'Arcy Exploration.

DCC's Planning Committee recommended approval of the applications on 6 September 2013, thereby extending to 2037 the operational life of the oilfields, beyond their original end-date of 2016.

[14][15] Bournemouth Christchurch and Poole Council leader Philip Broadhead called the leak "unacceptable...some serious questions need to be answered".

[16] The field is located in a faulted block of Jurassic and older rocks beneath the Hampshire Basin, close to the steeply sloping monocline in the overlying chalk.

[20] Oil is piped about 91 kilometres (57 mi) from Wytch Farm via Fawley to a terminal on the far side of Southampton Water at Hamble, for export by tanker.

[20] A rail terminal at Furzebrook connecting to the Swanage Railway between Corfe Castle and Wareham is now closed and mothballed.

Treated oil is cooled and stored in tanks before finally being pumped through the 16-inch (0.4 m) pipeline to the storage and loading facility at Hamble.

[22] Propane and butane (known collectively as LPG or liquefied petroleum gas) are maintained as liquids, they are odorised (with ethyl mercaptan) and stored in horizontal vessels on the site.