The Stuttgart Metropolitan Region is a

metropolitan region A metropolitan area or metro is a region consisting of a densely populated urban agglomeration and its surrounding territories which share industries, commercial areas, transport network, infrastructures and housing. A metropolitan area usually ...

in south-west

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

consisting of the

cities A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...

and regions around

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; ; Swabian German, Swabian: ; Alemannic German, Alemannic: ; Italian language, Italian: ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, largest city of the States of Germany, German state of ...

Heilbronn Heilbronn () is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in northern Baden-Württemberg, Germany, surrounded by Heilbronn (district), Heilbronn District. From the late Middle Ages on, it developed into an important trading centre. At the begi ...

Tübingen Tübingen (; ) is a traditional college town, university city in central Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is situated south of the state capital, Stuttgart, and developed on both sides of the Neckar and Ammer (Neckar), Ammer rivers. about one in ...

Reutlingen Reutlingen (; ) is a city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. It is the capital of the eponymous Reutlingen (district), district of Reutlingen. As of June 2018, it had an estimated population of 116,456. Reutlingen has a Reutlingen University, univ ...

. These cities are arranged into three

agglomeration Agglomeration may refer to: * Urban agglomeration, in standard English * Megalopolis, in Chinese English, as defined in China's ''Standard for basic terminology of urban planning'' (GB/T 50280—98). Also known as "city cluster". * Economies of agg ...

areas. The

population Population is a set of humans or other organisms in a given region or area. Governments conduct a census to quantify the resident population size within a given jurisdiction. The term is also applied to non-human animals, microorganisms, and pl ...

of the area is about 5,300,000 and it is one of the biggest regions in Germany. This area covers an area of ca 15,000 km². The Stuttgart metropolitan region is roughly 200 km south of

Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...

, 200 km west of

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

and about 600 km east of

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

. Other metropolitan areas around are

Rhine-Neckar The Rhine-Neckar Metropolitan Region (, ), often referred to as the Rhein-Neckar Triangle, is a polycentric Metropolitan regions in Germany, metropolitan region located in south western Germany, between the Frankfurt/Rhine-Main region to the nor ...

Frankfurt Rhine-Main The Rhine-Main Metropolitan Region, often simply referred to as Frankfurt Rhine-Main, Frankfurt Rhine-Main area or Rhine-Main area (German: ''Rhein-Main-Gebiet'', ''Frankfurt/Rhein-Main'' or ''FrankfurtRheinMain'', abbreviated FRM), is the third-l ...

, Nuremberg Metropolitan and Munich Metropolitan. The region is one of the economically strongest regions in Germany and

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

. Many well-known companies like

Mercedes-Benz Mercedes-Benz (), commonly referred to simply as Mercedes and occasionally as Benz, is a German automotive brand that was founded in 1926. Mercedes-Benz AG (a subsidiary of the Mercedes-Benz Group, established in 2019) is based in Stuttgart, ...

Porsche Dr. Ing. h.c. F. Porsche AG, usually shortened to Porsche (; see below), is a German automobile manufacturer specializing in luxury, high-performance sports cars, SUVs and sedans, headquartered in Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. Th ...

, Bosch, Mahle,

Lidl Lidl ( ) is a trademark, used by two Germany, German international discount supermarket, discount retailer chain store, chains that operates over 12,600 stores. The ''LD Stiftung'' operates the stores in Germany and the ''Lidl Stiftung & Co. K ...

Kaufland Kaufland () is a German hypermarket chain, part of the Schwarz Gruppe which also owns Lidl. The hypermarket directly translates to English as "buy-land." It opened its first store in 1984 in Neckarsulm and quickly expanded to become a major ch ...

Würth The Würth Group (, ) is a worldwide wholesaler of fasteners, screws and screw accessories. Würth expanded its range and today offers a full range of business equipment for craft businesses in a kind of supermarket of its own. Würth offers dow ...

Märklin Gebr. Märklin & Cie. GmbH or Märklin (stylized as ma̋rklín) (MÄRKLIN or MAERKLIN in capital letters) is a German toy company. The company was founded in 1859 and is based at Göppingen in Baden-Württemberg. Although it originally specialis ...

Stihl Andreas Stihl AG & Co. (commonly referred to as Stihl and styled as STIHL, , ) is a German manufacturer of chainsaws and other handheld power equipment including trimmers and blowers headquartered in Waiblingen, Baden-Württemberg, near Stutt ...

Kärcher Kärcher SE & Co. KG is a German family-owned parent company of a manufacturer of cleaning equipment and systems, headquartered in Winnenden, Baden-Württemberg. Kärcher is considered the global market leader in this segment and, as of 2023, ...

Trumpf Trumpf SE + Co. KG is a German family-owned company based in Ditzingen near Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg. It originates from Julius Geiger's mechanical workshop. The Trumpf and Leibinger families transformed the medium-sized company into a gl ...

and

Festo Festo is a German automation company based in Esslingen am Neckar, Germany. Festo produces and sells pneumatics, pneumatic and electrical control systems and drive technology for factories and Process automation system, process automation. Fe ...

have their worldwide headquarters in the region. Furthermore many small and medium-size hidden champions are located in the region, forming the German

Mittelstand (; composed of the words "''Mittel"'' for ''middle'' and "''Stand''" for ''class'') commonly refers to a group of stable business enterprises in Germany, Austria and Switzerland that have proved successful in enduring economic change and turbule ...

. International companies like

IBM International Business Machines Corporation (using the trademark IBM), nicknamed Big Blue, is an American Multinational corporation, multinational technology company headquartered in Armonk, New York, and present in over 175 countries. It is ...

Hewlett-Packard The Hewlett-Packard Company, commonly shortened to Hewlett-Packard ( ) or HP, was an American multinational information technology company. It was founded by Bill Hewlett and David Packard in 1939 in a one-car garage in Palo Alto, California ...

Intersport INTERSPORT International Corporation ("IIC"), commonly known as INTERSPORT, is an international sporting goods retailer with its headquarters based in Bern, Switzerland. IIC is the purchasing and brand management company of the INTERSPORT grou ...

Euronics Euronics International Ltd. is an international association of over 11,000 independent electrical retailers in 37 countries. It functions as a leading international electrical retail group on behalf of its members, and is based in Amsterdam ...

and

FrieslandCampina Royal FrieslandCampina N.V. is a Dutch multinational dairy cooperative which is based in Amersfoort, Netherlands. It is the result of a merger between Friesland Foods and Campina on 30 December 2008. The European Commission approved the merger ...

have their German headquarters in the region as well. Culturally the region is mostly Swabian, with some Franconian parts in the north. The region has a strong

wine Wine is an alcoholic drink made from Fermentation in winemaking, fermented fruit. Yeast in winemaking, Yeast consumes the sugar in the fruit and converts it to ethanol and carbon dioxide, releasing heat in the process. Wine is most often made f ...

and

beer Beer is an alcoholic beverage produced by the brewing and fermentation of starches from cereal grain—most commonly malted barley, although wheat, maize (corn), rice, and oats are also used. The grain is mashed to convert starch in the ...

tradition with many wine and beer festivals round the year. Most notably are the

Cannstatter Volksfest The Cannstatter Volksfest is an annual three-week Volksfest (beer festival and travelling funfair) in Stuttgart, Germany. It is sometimes also referred to by foreign visitors as the Stuttgart Beer Festival, although it is actually more of an au ...

(an

Oktoberfest Oktoberfest (; ) is the world's largest , featuring a beer festival and a travelling carnival, and is held annually in Munich, Bavaria, from mid- or late-September to the first Sunday in October. The annual event attracts more than seven milli ...

-like celebration that occurs twice a year), the Stuttgart wine festival and the Heilbronn wine festival. Typical dishes of the region are

Maultasche (; singular ''Maultasche'' , ) are a kind of large meat-filled dumpling in Swabian cuisine. They consist of sheets of pasta dough filled with minced meat, smoked meat, spinach, bread crumbs and onions and flavored with various herbs and spi ...

Spätzle Spätzle (), Spätzla or Spatzen, called ''nokedli'' () in Hungarian, are a type of Central European egg pasta typically served as a side for meat dishes with sauce. Commonly associated with Swabia (hence Swabian spaetzle) and Alsace, it is als ...

(e.g. as Linsen mit Spätzle),

Flädle Flädle is a southern German garnish and soup ingredient from the region of Baden-Württemberg consisting of savory pancakes, cut into ribbons.

soup,

Schupfnudel Schupfnudel (German; : ''Schupfnudeln''), also called Fingernudel (''finger noodle''), is a type of dumpling or thick noodle in southern German and Austrian cuisine. It is similar to the Central European kopytka and Italian gnocchi. They take ...

n and Zwiebelrostbraten.

Maps

XkDE-BW bevdichte 2007-EMR-Stuttgart-o.svg, Location of the Stuttgart Metropolitan Region (orange) in Baden-Württemberg

References

{{Authority control Metropolitan areas of Germany Stuttgart (region) Planning regions in Baden-Württemberg

Maps

See also

References