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ADX Florence is a 37-acre complex located at 5880 Highway 67, Florence, Colorado. It is part of four separate correctional facilities, representing four different security levels.

ADX Florence is a 490-bed facility that generally houses around 430 male prisoners divided into six security levels. The Federal Correctional Complex - Florence, including ADX Florence, was jointly designed by DLR Group Justice, a part of the architecture, engineering, planning and interiors firm specializing in handling justice-related facilities, and LKA Partners of Colorado Springs.

About 22% of inmates have killed fellow prisoners in other correctional facilities; 35% have attempted to attack other prisoners or officers. As a result, most individuals are kept for at least 23 hours each day in solitary confinement. They are housed in a 7-by-12 ft (3.5-by-2 m) room, built behind a steel door and grate. The remaining free hour is spent exercising alone in a separate concrete chamber. Prisoners rarely see each other, and the inmates' only direct human interaction is with correctional officers. Visiting from outside the prison is conducted through glass, with each prisoner in a separate chamber. Religious services are broadcast from a small chapel.

Part of the prison is a "stepdown" program, designed to encourage less antisocial behavior and eventually transfer prisoners out of the ADX and back to the Maximum Security population. The program is three years in length, each year allowing more freedom and social contact with other inmates. Any violation during the program means participants revert to year one.

Most cells' furniture is made almost entirely out of poured concrete, including a desk, stool, and bed covered by a thin mattress. Each chamber contains a toilet that shuts off if plugged, a shower that runs on a timer to prevent flooding, and a sink missing a potentially dangerous tap. Rooms may also be fitted with polished steel mirrors bolted to the wall, an electric light, a radio, a 13-inch black and white television set that shows recreational, educational and religious programming, and a cigarette lighter. These privileges can be taken away as punishment. The 4-in by 4-ft windows confuse the prisoner as to his specific location within the complex because one can see only the sky and roof. Telecommunication with the outside world is forbidden, and food is hand delivered by correctional officers.

The prison as a whole contains a multitude of motion detectors and cameras, 1,400 remote-controlled steel doors, and 12 ft (3.7 m) high razor wire fences. Laser beams, pressure pads, and attack dogs guard the area between the prison walls and razor wire.

Eric Rudolph, the Olympic Park bomber, lamented in a series of 2006 letters to a Colorado Springs newspaper that the ADX is meant to "inflict misery and pain."