Hongjiang, alias Qianyang, is located in the southwest of Hunan Province, upstream of Yuanshui River, in Xuefeng Mountain area on the eastern edge of Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, with Xupu County and Dongkou County in the east, Suining County and Huitong County in the south, Zhijiang Dong Autonomous County in the west and Huaihua City in the north. It belongs to Hunan Province and is managed by Huaihua City. The total area of the city is 2 174 square kilometers, and it governs 20 townships and 194 administrative villages.

It has successively won the honorary titles of "advanced counties and cities in county economic development in Hunan Province" and "advanced units in developing open economy in the whole province", and is a "national development and reform pilot city".