Groesbeek and Kranenburg are situated on the banks of the Groesbeek, a small stream in the Groesbeek valley, a large valley between the Nijmeegse heuvelrug and Reichswald. The Groesbeek valley was carved out by glaciers during the Saale glacial, marking the southernmost expansion of ice-age glaciers in the Netherlands. The hills surrounding the valley in which Groesbeek lies are technically the terminal moraines of those glaciers, but in contrast to the hills in the central and eastern Netherlands, these hills are rising by 0.5-0.8 mm/year due to tectonic uplift.