In geography, regions are areas broadly divided by physical characteristics (physical geography), human impact characteristics (human geography), and the interaction of humanity and the environment (environmental geography). Geographic regions and sub-regions are mostly described by their imprecisely defined, and sometimes transitory boundaries, except in human geography, where jurisdiction areas such as national borders are clearly defined in law.

France is divided into 18 administrative regions (, ), 13 of which are in Metropolitan France and five of which are overseas regions. The mainland regions and Corsica are each further subdivided into departments, ranging in number from 2 to 13 per region for the metropolitan regions; the overseas regions technically consist of only one department each.