It is located on the Côte Bleue just northwest of Marseille, neighbouring its 16th arrondissement within the larger Aix-Marseille-Provence Metropolis. It consists of a main village at Le Rove which houses the town hall, as well as a variety of hamlets and other settlements.

The Rove Tunnel, the world's longest canal tunnel at 7,120 metres (23,360 ft), has its southeastern entrance situated in Marseille near Le Rove, although a sizeable portion crosses the commune underground (from the Mediterranean towards the Étang de Berre), hence its name. It has been out of service since 1963.

Georges Rosso, the mayor of Le Rove, is the oldest mayor of any French city, at 93 years of age.

Le Rove is served by the Niolon TER PACA railway station (opened in 1915) on the Miramas–L'Estaque railway.

• 
  Station building
• 
  Railway line in Niolon

Historical population

Year Pop. ±% p.a. 1836 844 —     1841 880 +0.84% 1846 1,074 +4.06% 1851 849 −4.59% 1856 816 −0.79% 1861 875 +1.41% 1866 820 −1.29% 1872 790 −0.62% 1876 755 −1.13% 1881 729 −0.70% 1886 661 −1.94% 1891 726 +1.89% 1896 742 +0.44% 1901 704 −1.05% 1906 747 +1.19% 1911 2,122 +23.22%	Year Pop. ±% p.a. 1921 678 −10.78% 1926 688 +0.29% 1931 869 +4.78% 1936 485 −11.01% 1946 516 +0.62% 1954 705 +3.98% 1962 1,186 +6.72% 1968 1,709 +6.28% 1975 2,233 +3.89% 1982 2,707 +2.79% 1990 3,429 +3.00% 1999 4,031 +1.81% 2009 4,223 +0.47% 2014 4,607 +1.76% 2020 5,193 +2.02%
Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. Updates on reimplementing the Graph extension, which will be known as the Chart extension, can be found on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org.
Source: EHESS and INSEE (1968–2020)

• Sébastien Chato (born 1961), singer, author, composer, lived in Le Rove
• Alexandre Fabre (born 1955), actor, lives in Le Rove
• Maurice Gouiran (born 1946), thriller writer, born in Le Rove
• Malika Haimeur (born 1956), awarded the Irène Joliot-Curie Prize for Women & Business in 2009
• Franky Zapata (born 1978), creator of the Flyboard, lived in Le Rove with his workshop still there

• Communes of the Bouches-du-Rhône department

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Le Rove.