Hersonissos is 26 kilometres east of Heraklion, between Anissaras and Stalis.

Hersonissos has developed due to tourism and, in just a few decades, has grown into the largest tourist resort in Crete.

Hersonissos has about 3,000 permanent inhabitants (2,981 in the 2001 census), but this number increases exponentially each summer, with the thousands of seasonal workers in tourism, and of course the hundreds of thousands of tourists who come to Hersonissos on holiday.

Hersonissos is officially named Limenas Hersonissou (“Port of Hersonissos”), because it was once the harbour of the village of Αno Hersonissos (“Upper Hersonissos”), now known as Old Hersonissos. Ano Hersonissos is 2 kilometres south of seaside Hersonissos, which essentially developed from the 1960s onwards due to tourism. Until then it had been just a small village with a rudimentary harbour, from which local agricultural goods were exported.