The marmots are generally large ground squirrels in the genus Marmota, of which there are 15 species. Those most often referred to as marmots tend to live in mountainous areas, such as the Alps, northern Apennines, Eurasian steppes, Carpathians, Tatras, and Pyrenees in Europe and northwestern Asia; the Rocky Mountains, Black Hills, Cascades, and Sierra Nevada in North America; and the Deosai Plateau in Pakistan and Ladakh in India. The groundhog, however, is also sometimes called a marmot, while the similarly sized, but more social, prairie dog is not classified in the genus Marmota but in the related genus Cynomys.

Marmots typically live in burrows (often within rockpiles, particularly in the case of the yellow-bellied marmot), and hibernate there through the winter. Most marmots are highly social, and use loud whistles to communicate with one another, especially when alarmed.

Marmots mainly eat greens and many types of grasses, berries, lichens, mosses, roots and flowers.

The following is a list of all Marmota species recognized by Thorington and Hoffmanplus the recently defined M. kastschenkoi. They divide marmots into two subgenera.

Adrian Ballinger is a fully certified IFMGA/AMGA guide (one of only 70 in the USA), certified through the American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA Rock, Alpine, and Ski Certifications). Ballinger has been guiding full-time for 15 years, and has led over 100 international climbing expeditions on 5 continents. In 2004 Ballinger founded Alpenglow Expeditions, a mountaineering guide service specializing in high altitude guiding worldwide. Alpenglow Expeditions is the first American guide service to require AMGA/IFMGA certification from its lead guides, and is known for its small groups, low client:guide ratios, and top-quality logistics in all the countries they operate. Ballinger is also the lead Everest guide for Himalayan Experience—or HIMEX—considered by many as the premier 8000-meter peak guiding outfit in the world. Ballinger, along with HIMEX's founder, Russell Brice, has been featured on the Discovery Channel’s Everest: Beyond the Limit series. Ballinger has emerged as one of the premier high-altitude mountain guides in the world, leading clients up some of the world's biggest mountains. During the 2010 climbing season on Mt. Everest, Ballinger summited the mountain twice in 3 weeks, first on May 5 and then again on May 22. On his May 5 summit, Ballinger was the first non-sherpa of the season to summit, achieved while fixing ropes, replacing anchors, and removing old ropes from the mountain in partnership with 9 sherpa. Also in 2010, Ballinger led an Alpenglow Expeditions Clean Up Expedition on Ama Dablam. This team, along with summitting the mountain, removed thousands of feet of old fixed rope from the route, along with hundreds of pounds of trash from the camps. They also provided outreach to sherpa and members of other climbing teams to teach the use of human waste disposal kits while on the mountain, and donated human waste disposal bags to many of those teams. In 2011, he repeated his feat of summiting Everest twice (May 5 and May 20) in only a few weeks and added his first summit of Lhotse (May 26) to that schedule as well. Ballinger has led successful expeditions to more than 25 Himalayan summits over 6000 meters, including eight ascents of Ama Dablam—a highly technical 6800m peak next to Everest. Since 2007, he has guided clients to the summit of Everest 3 times,Manaslu 3 times, and has guided on Cho Oyu. Ballinger has also guided extensively on many of the world's iconic peaks, including Kilimanjaro (13 times by 4 different routes), Denali (by the West Rib), Alpamayo (14 times by 3 different routes), Huascaran Sur (3 times by 2 routes), Cotopaxi (more than 30 times), and many other expeditions including multiple ascents on Orizaba, Huayna Potosi, Quitaraju, Chopicalqui, Chimborazo, Cayambe, Mt. Blanc, Island Peak, Lobuche Peak, Mera Peak and many North American peaks. Ballinger's personal ascents include technical alpine-style climbs on the South Ridge of Pumo Ri, the West Face of Cayesh, and the NE Ridge of Huascaran Norte. Ballinger also ski, ice, and rock guides in his dual “hometowns” of Squaw Valley, California and Chamonix, France (with lots of time in nearby La Grave), guiding in the Mt Blanc region for Chamonix Experience. Ballinger is sponsored by Marmot, La Sportiva, Edelrid, and Kaenon Polarized. Ballinger has been featured in many magazine articles and industry papers.

Sir Michael Gideon Marmot (born 26 January 1945) is professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at University College London.

Michael Marmot was born in London, England. He moved to Australia as a young child and graduated in Medicine from the University of Sydney, Australia, in 1968. He earned a MPH in 1972 and PhD in 1975 from the University of California, Berkeley. He became Fellow of the (English) Faculty of Public Health Medicine in 1989 and was appointed Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health at UCL in 1985. This became a joint Chair, held at UCL and the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, in 1990. He became Director of the International Centre for Health and Society (now the International Institute for Society and Health) that he established at UCL in 1994. He was a member of the Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution and awarded an MRC Professorship in 1995. He was elected as a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians in 1996. In 2004 he was awarded the Balzan Prize for Epidemiology. He was Chair of the WHO Commission on Social Determinants of Health from 2005 to 2008.