El Cajon, CA Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
970 ft 295 m820 ft 250 m740 ft 225 m580 ft 175 m420 ft 130 m340 ft 105 m
Contours every 100 ft, bold every 500 ft
USGS 3DEP · U.S. Census Bureau
How to use this mapviews, tools and data
- Elevation
- Ground colored by height from green (lowest) to white (highest), with contour lines every 40–500 ft (USGS data).
- Satellite
- A 2016 satellite photo at 33 ft (10 m) detail; contours off.
- 3D
- Tilt and turn the terrain; hills are raised 1.5×, or set ×1 for true height.
- Click or tap anywhere
- The exact elevation of that spot in ft and m.
- Measure
- Pick two points for the climb, descent and grade along a straight line.
- City area
- Fades everything outside the official city limits (US Census).
Elevation Data
El Cajon sits at about 480 ft (145 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.
Typical elevation
480 ft 145 m
most residents: 440–660 ft
Lowest
340 ft 105 m
on the northwest side
Highest
970 ft 295 m
at the foot of the Fletcher Hills
Average
530 ft 160 m
all land inside city limits
El Cajon spans about 630 ft of height, so no single spot tells the whole story. The ruler shows where its people live, and where the other numbers you'll see come from.
| Figure | Elevation |
|---|---|
| Typical Where people live: half of residents higher, half lower | 480 ft145 m |
| Highest point Inside city limits, at the foot of the Fletcher Hills | 970 ft295 m |
| Lowest point Inside city limits, on the northwest side | 340 ft105 m |
| Town center USGS map point for El Cajon | 440 ft135 m |
| Airport (SAN) FAA airport elevation, the highest point of its runways, 11 mi west of the city limits | 17 ft5 m |
| Average of all land | 530 ft160 m |
| Nearest peak San Miguel Mountain, 5.0 mi south of the city limits (NGS survey) | 2,569 ft783 m |
Elevation profile, west to east
6.2 mi west to east through the town center.
Topographic Map
- Location
- City in San Diego County, California, United States
- Population
- 103,291 2024 est.
- Land area
- 14.5 sq mi
- Density
- 7,119 per sq mi
- Coordinates
- 32.7948° N, 116.9625° W
- Time zone
- Pacific UTC−8 / −7
- Landform region
- Lower Californian
- Drains to
- Pacific Ocean
- Airport
- San Diego International (SAN) 17 ft
- ZIP codes 4
- 92019 92020 92021 92071
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WebP, 1200 × 900. Free to use: credit “ElevationOf.com” with a link to this page.
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, USGS, FAA
Nearby Places
Nearby towns by typical elevation
- Granite Hills650 ft
- Casa de Oro-Mount Helix640 ft
- Winter Gardens620 ft
- Lakeside590 ft
- Rancho San Diego560 ft
- La Mesa550 ft
- Spring Valley490 ft
- El Cajon480 ft
- Bostonia470 ft
- Lemon Grove430 ft
- Santee390 ft
Rankings by typical elevation
- Towns in California750th highest of 1,622
- Towns in San Diego County34th highest of 57
Peaks and hills nearest, by height
- Viejas Mountain4,189 ft
- Lyons Peak3,741 ft
- El Cajon Mountain3,677 ft
- Woodson Mountain2,901 ft
- San Miguel Mountain2,569 ft
How we measure
- Typical elevation: the population-weighted median: every 2020 Census block inside the city limits, at its USGS 3DEP height, weighted by the people who live there. Half of residents live higher, half lower.
- Lowest, highest, average: USGS 3DEP bare-earth heights on a 1 arc-second (≈100 ft, 30 m) grid, land only, inside the Census city limits (TIGER, Jan 1 2026).
- Nearby Places: nearby towns and rankings use each town's typical elevation, so every town is compared like for like. Rankings count every city, town, township and census-designated place, including places inside a town. Peaks and hills: the nearest summits with at least 980 ft (300 m) of prominence within 62 mi (100 km), then federal (GNIS) summits within 16 mi (25 km) when there are fewer than 5; each is the 3DEP top on a ~7 ft (2 m) window, or the NGS published height when a usable survey mark sits within 160 ft (50 m) of it (shown as published).
- Rounding: computed heights are rounded to 10 ft (5 m), or to 1 ft (1 m) under 100 ft; 3DEP is good to about a meter, not a foot. Published figures (FAA airport elevation, NGS survey heights) are shown as their publisher gives them.
- Datum: North American Vertical Datum of 1988 (NAVD 88). NGS plans to replace NAVD 88 with a new datum (NAPGD2022); heights will then shift slightly.
- Sources: USGS 3DEP, GNIS, Watershed Boundary Dataset and physiographic provinces; U.S. Census Bureau (boundaries, 2020 blocks, 2024 population estimates, Gazetteer areas, ZIP code areas); FAA airport data; BTS time zones; NOAA NGS survey heights. All public domain.