The Gauteng province is home to over 12 million people and is the densest in South Africa, but it remains spatially organised as a sprawling region of geographically distinct towns and cities.

Its most internationally recognisable cities are Johannesburg and Pretoria, although there are other significant urban centres. Many of these are located within the provincial boundary, and many fall outside it. Gauteng is the economic powerhouse of South Africa and the broader Southern African Development Community (SADC).

The Gauteng City-Region is an area larger than the Gauteng province and has an undefined boundary.

It is not physically or politically delineated but encapsulates towns and cities near to Gauteng that are part of its wider urban network – connected by flows of raw materials and resources, energy, people, money and communications. This wider Gauteng City-region generates almost 45% of national GDP (OECD 2011) and has a population close to 16,8 million people when calculated as a 175km radius around Johannesburg (Census 2011 SAL).