T�bingen is the capital of an eponymous district and an eponymous administrative region (Regierungsbezirk), before 1973 called S�dw�rttemberg-Hohenzollern.
T�bingen is, with nearby Reutlingen (about 15 km (9.3 mi) east), one of the two centre cities of the Neckar-Alb region.
Administratively, it is not part of the Stuttgart Region, bordering it to the north and west (Esslingen district in the north and B�blingen district in the west). However, the city and northern parts of its district can be regarded as belonging to that region in a wider regional and cultural context.
Immediately north of the city lies the Sch�nbuch, a densely wooded nature park. The Swabian Alb mountains rise about 20 km to the southeast of T�bingen.
The Ammer and Steinlach rivers discharge into the Neckar river, which flows right through the town, just south of the medieval old town in an easterly direction. Large parts of the city are hilly, with the Schlossberg and the �sterberg in the city centre and the Schnarrenberg and Herrlesberg, among others, rising immediately adjacent to the inner city.
The highest point is at about 500 m (1,640.42 ft) above sea level near Bebenhausen in the Sch�nbuch forest, while the lowest point is 305 m (1,000.66 ft) in the town's eastern Neckar valley. Nearby the Botanical Gardens of the city's university, in a small forest called Elysium, lies the geographical centre of the state of Baden-W�rttemberg
