Cumbernauld in the context of M80 motorway

Greater Glasgow is an urban settlement in Scotland consisting of all localities which are physically attached to the city of Glasgow, forming with it a single contiguous urban area (or conurbation). It does not relate to municipal government boundaries, and its territorial extent is defined by National Records of Scotland, which determines settlements in Scotland for census and statistical purposes. Greater Glasgow had a population of 1,199,629 at the time of the 2001 UK Census making it the largest urban area in Scotland and the fifth-largest in the United Kingdom. However, the population estimate for the Greater Glasgow 'settlement' (a chain of continuously populated postcodes) in mid-2016 was 985,290—the reduced figure explained by the removal of the Motherwell & Wishaw (124,790), Coatbridge & Airdrie (91,020), and Hamilton (83,730) settlement areas east of the city due to small gaps between the populated postcodes. The 'new towns' of Cumbernauld (which had a 2016 settlement population of 50,920) and East Kilbride (75,120) were never included in these figures despite their close ties to Glasgow due to having a clear geographical separation from the city. In the 2020 figures (with almost the same boundaries as 2016, the main difference being the re-addition of Barrhead), the Greater Glasgow population had risen to just over 1 million.

A more extensive Greater Glasgow concept covers a much larger area and may include Ayrshire down to Ayr as well as the whole of Lanarkshire down to Lanark, Dunbartonshire, Renfrewshire, and Inverclyde. At present, the Glasgow City Region consists of the Glasgow City Council, North Lanarkshire, South Lanarkshire, West Dunbartonshire, East Dunbartonshire, Renfrewshire, East Renfrewshire, and Inverclyde Local Authorities, with a combined population of over 1.7 million. This city-region is described as a metropolitan area by its own strategic planning authority and is similar to the Glasgow metropolitan area identified by the European Union.

There are several types of mass media in Scotland: television, cinema, radio, newspapers, magazines, game design and websites. The majority of Scotland's media is located in Glasgow, the countries largest city, which serves as the HQ for much of the countries major media employers such as broadcasters BBC Scotland and STV, radio services including BBC Radio Scotland, Clyde 1 and Pure Radio Scotland. Game design and production company, Rockstar North, has its international offices in the countries capital city, Edinburgh.

Scotland has a number of production companies which produce films and television programmes for Scottish, British and international audiences. Production companies are mostly located in Scotland's cities including Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen, as well as production facilities in areas such as North Lanarkshire, Fife and Dumfrieshire. Wardpark Studios in Cumbernauld is one of Scotland's television and film production studios where the television programme Outlander is produced. Dumbarton Studios, located in Dumbarton is largely used for BBC Scotland programming, used for the filming and production of television programmes such as Still Game, River City, Two Doors Down, and Shetland.

Stirlingshire or the County of Stirling (Scottish Gaelic: Siorrachd Sruighlea [ˈʃirˠəxk ˈs̪t̪ɾuʝlə]) is a historic county and registration county of Scotland. Its county town is Stirling.

It borders Perthshire to the north, Clackmannanshire to the east, West Lothian to the south-east, Lanarkshire to the south, and Dunbartonshire to the south and south-west (this latter boundary is split in two owing to Dunbartonshire's Cumbernauld exclave).