The South German Scarplands run (from north(-northeast) to south(-southwest)) more or less between the southern Rhön, the Spessart, the Odenwald and the Black Forest in the west, the Franconian Jura in the east, the Swabian Jura to the southeast and the northeastern foothills of the Jura to the south.
The wooded west and northwest-facing scarps drop sharply towards the Rhine Rift Valley and the Rhine-Main Plain, whilst the dip slopes fall comparatively gradually towards the (north-)east into the depressions beyond which lie the Thuringian Forest, Thuringian Highland, Franconian Forest, Fichtelgebirge, Upper Palatine Forest and Bavarian Forest.