Pontesbury is a village and civil parish in Shropshire and is approximately eight miles southwest of the county town of Shrewsbury. In the 2011 census, its population was 3,227. The village of Minsterley is just over a mile further southwest. The A488 road runs through the village, on its way from Shrewsbury to Bishop's Castle. The Rea Brook flows close by to the north with the village itself nestling on the northern edge of the Shropshire Hills AONB. Shropshire County Council in their current Place Plan detail the development strategy and refer to Pontesbury and neighbouring Minsterley as towns.

The village has a long mining history, once linked to Snailbeach and Hanwood via the Minsterley branch line and the Snailbeach District Railways, it supplied local industry with coal, lead, iron and stone. Although the railway tracks are no longer there, the route that it took can still be walked, where some stations and sidings remain. Nearby Poles Coppice, around half-a-mile south of the village, contains two former quarries and is now a countryside recreation area.

Nearby is Earl's Hill, which is the site of an Iron Age hillfort built around 600 B.C. and making it a Scheduled Ancient Monument and also designated an SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest) for its wildlife value. It was Shropshire Wildlife Trust's first nature reserve in 1964. Earl's Hill is PreCambrian in origin, being formed approximately 650 million years ago as a result of volcanic activity along the Pontesford-Linley fault.