Elevation Map of United States
This United States topographic elevation map shows the landscape in 24 terraced elevation bands. The scale runs from -86 meters (-282 ft) up to 4,421 meters (14,505 ft). Each band steps through the relief in sequence, so the map reads like a physical relief model. Lowlands appear in deep greens, middle elevations warm into golds and reds, and the highest terrain fades into grays and whites.
United States covers about 8,080,464 square kilometers (3,119,867 sq mi). This map frames the contiguous 48 states, and remarkably, the highest and lowest points in that frame sit just 85 miles apart in California.
Highest Point in United States
Mount Whitney, at 14,505 ft (4,421 m), is the highest point in United States. Nationally, Denali in Alaska stands far higher at 20,310 ft (6,190 m), but it lies outside the contiguous frame of this map. On this topographic map, it anchors the pale summit end of the elevation scale.
Lowest Point in United States
The lowest point in United States is Badwater Basin in Death Valley, at 282 ft (86 m) below sea level. On the relief map, this terrain fills the deep green base of the color scale.
United States Map Datasets
I prepared this relief map with elevation data from the AWS Terrain Tiles dataset. The dataset builds on the NASA Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM) along with other open topographic sources, and it serves global elevation data as map tiles that anyone can access.
The map spaces its 24 elevation bands with a blend of two methods. Half of the spacing follows equal elevation steps. The other half follows equal land area, a technique known as histogram equalization.
Why blend them?
A fixed interval scale would leave flatter regions sitting in a single color, which hides their topography. On the other hand, full histogram equalization would push a quarter of the land into summit tones. The blend lets this elevation map use the entire relief palette while the legend stays honest. Each label marks the true elevation behind its band, which is why the values are not evenly spaced.
