This municipality is famous for its duck-raising industry and especially for producing balut, a Filipino delicacy, which is a boiled, fertilised duck egg. Pateros is also known for the production of red salty eggs and "inutak", a local rice cake. Moreover, the town is known for manufacturing of "alfombra", a locally-made footwear with a carpet-like fabric on its top surface. Pateros is bordered by the following highly urbanized cities of Pasig to the north, Makati to the west, and Taguig to the south.

Pateros is the only municipality and the smallest, both in population and in land area, in Metro Manila, but it is the second most densely populated at around 29,000 people per square kilometer after Manila.

Pateros is approximately 13 kilometers southeast of Manila and north of the Pasig River. It lies between 1210° 03' 35" and 1210° 04' 40" longitude and 140° 32' 20" and 140° 33' 20" latitude. It is bounded by Pasig City on the northeast, the City of Taguig on the south, and Makati City on the northwest and the Pateros River on the west.

The municipal government of Pateros claims that its original land area was not its present land area of 2.10 km² but 1,040 hectares (10.4 km²) including Fort BOnifacio, particularly Barangays Comembo, Pembo, East Rembo, West Rembo, Cembo, South Cembo and Pitogo which are now part of the city of Makati and Bonifacio Global City (known as Post Proper Northside by Makati, and Mamancat, the former part of Pateros) which was made part of Taguig, based on documents and official maps obtained by former Pateros Councilor Dominador Rosales from 30 libraries and offices including USA Library of Congress and USA Archives. One of those maps was the 1968 Land Classification Map of the Bureau of Land. This Municipality only has 10 Barangays.

According to the 2015 Census, the age group with the highest population in Pateros is 20 to 24, with 6,354 individuals. Conversely, the age group with the lowest population is 80 and over, with 486 individuals.

Vendors continues to sell balut in Pateros, taking advantage of the association of the food item to the town with duck eggs supplied from neighboring provinces in the Calabarzon region. While the duck raising industry in the town is now minimal, the local government is encouraging the growth of the balut industry. It gives tax exemptions to balut vendors in the town. As of 2017, the local government is encouraging the growth of other industries in Pateros such as business process outsourcing although the town's size, 1.76 square kilometers (0.68 sq mi), remains a hindrance.

According to the town's 2005 classification report. 3.13% of its land area is classified as commercial, 0.39% industrial, and 0.88% agricultural.