Coventry, United Kingdom

As with the rest of the British Isles and the Midlands, Coventry experiences a maritime climate with cool summers and mild winters. The nearest Met Office weather station is Coundon/Coventry Bablake. Temperature extremes recorded in Coventry range from −18.2 °C (−0.8 °F) in February 1947, to 38.9 °C (102.0 °F) in July 2022. The lowest temperature reading of recent years was −10.8 °C (12.6 °F) during December 2010.

Coventry forms the largest part of the Coventry and Bedworth Urban Area. The city proper covers an area of almost 100 km2 (39 sq mi).

The protected West Midlands Green Belt, which surrounds the city on all sides, has prevented the expansion of the city into both the administrative county of Warwickshire and the metropolitan borough of Solihull (the Meriden Gap), and has helped to prevent the coalescence of the city with surrounding towns such as Kenilworth, Nuneaton, Leamington Spa, Warwick and Rugby as well as the large village of Balsall Common.

Panoramic views of Coventry City Centre from the cathedral tower

The spire of the ruined cathedral forms one of the "three spires" which have dominated the city skyline since the 14th century, the others being those of Christ Church (of which only the spire survives) and Holy Trinity Church (which is still in use).

Historically, Coventry was the most important seat of ribbon-making in the UK. In this industry it competed locally with Norwich and Leicester and internationally with Saint-Étienne in France.

Coventry has been a centre of motor and cycle manufacturing. Starting with Coventry Motette, The Great Horseless Carriage Company, Swift Motor Company, Humber, Hillman, Riley, Francis-Barnett and Daimler and Triumph motorcycles having its origins in 1902 in a Coventry factory. The Massey Ferguson tractor factory was situated on Banner Lane, Tile Hill, until it closed in the early 2000s.

Although the motor industry has declined almost to the point of extinction, Jaguar Land Rover has retained its Jaguar brand headquarters in the city (at Whitley) and an Advanced R&D team at the University of Warwick, while Peugeot still have a large parts centre in Humber Road despite the closure of its Ryton factory (formerly owned by the Rootes Group) just outside the city in December 2006 with the loss of more than 2,000 jobs – denting the economy of Coventry shortly before the onset of a recession which sparked further economic decline and high unemployment.

On 7 December 2017 it was announced that the city would be the 2021 UK City of Culture, being the third such place to hold the title after Derry in 2013 and Hull in 2017. After the financial collapse of the Coventry City of Culture Trust, set up to run legacy projects following Coventry's year as UK City of Culture in 2021, local MP Taiwo Owatemi raised an adjournment debate in the House of Commons.

The African American actor Ira Aldridge managed Coventry Theatre after impressing the people of the city with his acting during a tour in 1828. He was born in New York in 1807, but moved to England when he was 18, and is considered the UK's first black Shakespearean performer.

The poet Philip Larkin was born and brought up in Coventry, where his father was the City Treasurer.

During the early 19th-century, Coventry was well known due to author George Eliot who was born near Nuneaton, Warwickshire. The city was the model for her famous novel Middlemarch (1871).

Coventry has two universities; Coventry University is situated on a modern city centre campus while the University of Warwick lies 3.5 miles (5.6 kilometres) to the south of the city centre. The University of Warwick is one of only five universities never to have been rated outside the top ten in terms of teaching excellence and research and is a member of the prestigious Russell Group. The university won the BBC TV University Challenge trophy in April 2007 and April 2021. Coventry University is one of only a handful of universities to run a degree course in automotive design, which is in its Coventry School of Art and Design.

Coventry also has two further education colleges within city boundaries, Coventry College and Hereward College.