North: Yen Bai, Lao Cai.

East: Hoa Binh and Phu Tho.

West: Lai Chau, Dien Bien.

Southern: Thanh Hoa.

Son La, whose climate is subtemperate, has two seasons: the dry and the wet. The average annual temperature is 21.40C, with highs peaking at 270C and lows being 160C. Annual rainfall averages 1,200- 1,600 mm and average humidity is 81%. The number of days with the dry west wind in a year increased to 4.3 in Son La Town and 37.2 in Yen Chau. However, the climate in the plateaus of Moc Chau and Na San is cool, fresh, and advantageous to the development of agriculture and tourism.

Mineral: Son La has more than 50 mineral mines and pits, many of which are precious mines such as nickel, copper in the Phuc - Muong Khoa mountainous village (Bac Yen); talcum in Ta Phu mountainous village (Moc Chau district); manherit in Phung mountainous village (Mã river); coal inSuối Bàng commune (Moc Chau district) and Quynh Nhai district and other precious minerals such as gold, mercury, iron that can be exploited to develope the mining industry in the near future. Especially with sources of limestone, clay, kaolin with large reserve and good quality,the province has potential to develop industries of  construction materials such as cement, high quality sand, construction stone, adobe brick, paving stones.

Forest resource: Son La has many kind of plants and animals which are very abundant and diverse. Son La Forests have many genetic resources of precious species and special used forests which are valuable for scientific research such as Sop Cop, Xuan Nha (Moc Chau), Ta Xua (Bac Yen), Co Pia (Thuan Chau).

Water resourse: Surface water resources of Son La province is about 19 billion m3, mainly from rainwater stored in two main river systems, namely Da River and Ma River.

• Da river is derived from Yunnan province (Chinese) with its basin area of 9844 km2 in Son La territory. It flows through Son La on a length of 250 km and the total amount of water flowing to Son La hydropower project is 47,6.109 m3.
• Ma River originates from Tuan Giao and Dien Bien - Lai Chau. Itpasses through Son La on a length of 93 km and has basin area of about 3,978 km2.
• Besides the two main river systems, Son La province also has 35 major streams and hundreds of small streams located on steep terrain with many waterfalls.

Land resource: The natural area of Son La province is the 5^th biggest among 64 provinces in the country. The land being in use accounts for 39.08%. Fertile soil with thick layers and various types of soil allow the province to develope variety of plants and animals which produce high economic value. The unused land and area of streams, rivers accounts for 60.92%.

Land fund for development of long-term industrial crops such as coffee, tea, fruit trees is 23,520 ha, for pasture to grow livestock is 1,167 ha.