Urban forests are forests located in cities. They are an important component of urban green infrastructure systems. Urban forests use appropriate tree and vegetation species, instead of noxious and invasive kinds, which reduce the need of maintenance and irrigation. In addition, native species also provide aesthetic value while reducing cost. Diversity of plant species should also be considered in design of urban forests to avoid monocultures; this makes the urban forests more durable and resilient to pests and other harms.
;Benefits
* Energy use: According to a study conducted by the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Sacramento Municipal Utility District, it was found that strategically located shade trees planted around houses can provide up to 47% energy savings for heating and cooling.
* Urban heat island mitigation: Maximum air temperature for tree groves were found to be lower than that of open areas without trees. This is contributed to by the principal processes of evaporative cooling from transpiration, radiation interception from the shading effect of canopies, and increasing urban surface roughness to enhance its convective cooling efficiency. 
* Water management: Urban forests helps with city water management on diverting storm water from water channels. Trees intercept a large amount of rainfall that hit them.
* Air pollution: Trees hold carbon, which improves air quality in cities. 
* Property values: In response to fluctuating demand from residents wanting increased amounts of urban greenery, increasing vegetation like tree cover within urban areas can result in the surrounding areas of real estate to increase in value.
* Public health: Urban greenery can also improve mental health and well-being. Creating urban forests affects public health in many ways. Urban heat islands are created by the condensation of heat due to the materials and infrastructure used in metropolitan areas, which can negatively impact human health. Urban forests provide natural shading structures at a fraction of the cost of artificial shading structures and it counters the negative health impacts of increasing global temperatures. Beyond countering the negative impacts of man-made infrastructure, green infrastructure has the potential to enhance existing ecosystems and make them more stable, which has been historically done in traditional Japanese agriculture.  Green infrastructure in an urbanized area can help restore and enhance the resiliency of an ecosystem to natural disturbances and disasters that disrupt the lives of residents.  Building new urban forests in an existing metropolitan area creates new labor jobs that do not require a high level of education, which can decrease unemployment in the working class which benefits society.  Furthermore, green infrastructure helps states to implement the principles of the 1992 Rio Declaration on Environment and Development that was designed to alleviate the social and economic consequences of environmental degradation.