Guizhou ( listen (help·info), simplified Chinese: 贵州; traditional Chinese: 貴州; pinyin: Guìzhōu; Wade–Giles: Kuei-chou; Postal map spelling: Kweichow) is a province of the People's Republic of China located in the southwestern part of the country. Its provincial capital city is Guiyang.

Throughout its prehistory and history, Guizhou was home to Miao people　苗族 and other non-Han people, ethnically akin to ancient Vietnamese. From about the third to the first centuries BCE, Guizhou saw the existence of the powerful and independent Yelang state 夜郎国, which covered parts of modern day Guizhou, Hunan, Sichuan and Yunnan provinces.

During the 8th and 9th centuries, the Tang Dynasty sent Chinese soldiers into Guizhou 貴州(Kweichow) and stationed there. Some of them married native women there, and their descendants are known as Lao-han-jen (original Chinese), in contrast to new Chinese who colonized Guizhou at later times. The Lao-han-jen still speak an archaic dialect. Many immigrants to Guizhou were descended from these soldiers in garrisons who married non Chinese women.

It was not until the Ming Dynastythat Guizhou came under heavy Chinese resettlement and domination during which it was made a province. This prompted mass migration from Sichuan, Hunan and its surrounding provinces into Guizhou. However, the Miao Poeple resisted to be sinified, and protested multiple times against the Chinese invasion of Ming Empire, which is described as the Miao Rebellions (Ming Dynasty) in orthodox Chinese history.

Throughout its history, Guizhou was one of the southern places that Chinese governments in north China had been dispatching their political exiles and criminals.

During the Qing Dynasty, Han Chinese soldiers moved into the Taijiang region of Guozhou, subjecting the region and people to the imperial rule of China. Many of the soldiers married Miao women, and the children were brought up in the culture of Miao.

From the sixteenth to the early nineteenth centuries, its native Miao people organized many resistances throughout the Qing Dynasty like the rebellion in 1735, the uprising of 1795-1806 and the longest being the revolt of 1854–1873. It was said in the Qing Dynasty that every thirty years there would be minor revolts, while every sixty years there would be major rebellions. All the revolts would be violently suppressed by the imperial government of Qin from Peking, resulting in systematic massacres of the Miao people, reducing local population to 30-40% less than the original.

Guizhou adjoins Sichuan Province and Chongqing Municipality to the north, Yunnan Province to the west, Guangxi Province to the south and Hunan Province to the east. Overall Guizhou is a mountainous province however it is more hilly in the west while the eastern and southern portions are relatively flat. The western part of the province forms part of the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau.

Other cities include: Anshun, Kaili, Zunyi, Duyun, Liupanshui and Qingzhen.

Guizhou has a subtropical humid climate. There are few seasonal changes. Its annual average temperature is roughly 10 to 20 °C, with January temperatures ranging from 1 to 10°C and July temperatures ranging from 17 to 28 °C.

Like in China's other southwest provinces, rural areas of Guizhou suffered severe drought during spring 2010. One of China's poorest provinces, Guizhou is experiencing serious environmental problems, such as desertification and persistent water shortages. On 3–5 April 2010, China's Premier Wen Jiabao went on a three days inspection tour in the southwest drought-affected province of Guizhou, where he met villagers and called on agricultural scientists to develop drought-resistant technologies for the area.