R is a widely used open-source statistical software environment used by over 2 million data scientists and analysts. It is based on the S programming language and is developed by the R Foundation. R provides a flexible and powerful environment for statistical analysis, modeling, and data visualization. Some key advantages include being free, having an extensive community for support, and allowing for automated replication through scripting. However, it also has some drawbacks like having a steep learning curve and scripts sometimes being difficult to understand.