In "Stranger Things," the fictional town of Hawkins is located in Roane County, Indiana.
Roane County is part of the show's invented geography. Hawkins itself is fictional, as is Roane County, but the series consistently presents the town as an Indiana community about 80 miles from Indianapolis. Its rural setting, forests, farmland, schools, and close-knit neighborhoods help create the nostalgic small-town atmosphere of the story.
The county is also tied to Hawkins National Laboratory, the secret government facility whose experiments help open a gateway to the Upside Down. Many of the series' major events—including Will Byers's disappearance, the Demogorgon attacks, and the later rifts—center on Hawkins and its surrounding county.
A common mix-up is confusing Roane County with real counties in Indiana or with Roane County, Tennessee and West Virginia. The production filmed much of Hawkins in Georgia, but within the story, the town is in fictional Roane County, Indiana.