Vashi is a residential as well as commercial township of Navi Mumbai. It was one of the first "nodes" developed by CIDCO and is one of the oldest and most populated nodes in Navi Mumbai.

Vashi is connected to Mumbai by a railway and road over bridge, which is built over the Thane Creek. Vashi Bridge (also known as Thane Creek Bridge or the Mankhurd-Vashi Bridge) links the suburb of Mankhurd in Mumbai with Vashi in Navi Mumbai, the satellite city of Mumbai. The bridge of 1837m length and having a substandard 3 lane carriageway, is one of the four entry points into Mumbai, and handles traffic directed towards the regions to the south and east of Mumbai. The modern bridge was built in the 1970s.

There are five Shopping malls functioning in Vashi, named Center One, City Center, Raghuleela, Inorbit and Palm Beach Galleria. Besides this, few other malls are also coming up in the city.

Vashi hosts a number of colleges including Father Agnel College, ICLES Motilal Jhunjhunwala College and Karmaveer Bhaurao Patil College (formerly known as Modern College). The Mumbai Divisional SSC Board, one of the divisional boards of the Maharashtra State Board of Secondary Education is headquartered in Vashi in Sector 16-A.