Mayberry is a fictional community that was the setting for two popular American television sitcoms, The Andy Griffith Show (1960–1968) and Mayberry R.F.D. (1968–1971); Mayberry was also the setting for a 1986 reunion television film titled Return to Mayberry. The town is also frequently mentioned in the spin-off program Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C., and is seen when Pyle returns to visit his home town. Mayberry is said to be based on Andy Griffith's hometown of Mount Airy, North Carolina. Mount Airy is also known as Mayberry and called by both names by its residents.

According to show episodes, the community of Mayberry was named for fictional founder John Mayberry. In the 1964 episode “The Pageant,” Mayberry celebrates its centennial, implying its founding was in 1864. Purportedly, Andy Griffith himself chose the name of the fictional community. Griffith, however, told Larry King in 2003 that Artie Stander is the person who thought of the name Mayberry; Stander was one of the show's creators and writers.

"Mayberry" is mentioned many times in television shows such as Cheers, House, Criminal Minds, Supernatural, How I Met Your Mother, FROM, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and Scrubs.^{[citation needed]} According to the episode "The Battle of Mayberry," the town was almost named Taylortown in honor of Colonel Carleton Taylor, who was one of the first settlers in the town.

Mayberry had one traffic light and little in the way of indigenous crime with the exception perhaps of moonshining and bootlegging. Speeding was also mentioned in the area, like that on Highway 6 in the fourth season episode "Barney's Sidecar." Out-of-town bank robbers, scam artists, escaped convicts, and vagrants occasionally found their way to Mayberry. The county and the town share the same name and jurisdiction. In episode 44 "Sheriff Barney," the mayor of nearby Greendale relates that Mayberry County has had the lowest crime rate in the state for two years in a row under Sheriff Taylor. The town only had one long-distance telephone line, as referenced in the episode "Man in a Hurry," that two old ladies shared each Sunday preventing others from using the telephone.

In the opening scene of season 8, episode 30 (the last episode), a sign at the railroad station lists the population and elevation of Mayberry:

However, this conflicts with the comment made by choir director John Masters to Andy Taylor, that "there's got to be a decent tenor in a town of two-thousand people" in the episode The Song Festers – season 4, episode 20. And, in season 7, episode 23 ("The Statue"), Howard Sprague refers to a population of 1,800.

Because the county and the town both have the same name, it's possible that the county's population is 5,360 and the town's is somewhere between 1,800 and 2,000.

Many assume Mayberry was loosely based on Andy Griffith's hometown of Mount Airy, North Carolina; however, Griffith has indicated that nearby Pilot Mountain, also in Surry County, North Carolina, inspired him in creating the town. Pilot Mountain likely was the inspiration for the fictional town of "Mount Pilot," a nearby larger town in relation to Mayberry, often referred to and occasionally visited by the characters in The Andy Griffith Show. The county seat of Surry County is in Dobson; thus, this is the location of the nearest courthouse to Mount Airy. One episode has a fictional nearby location – "Pierce County." Another episode has Barney Fife referring to Sheriff Taylor and himself as "the law west of Mount Pilot".