San Rafael, CA Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
1,060 ft 325 m800 ft 245 m660 ft 205 m400 ft 120 m130 ft 40 m0 ft 0 m
Contours every 200 ft, bold every 1,000 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
San Rafael sits at about 61 ft (19 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.
Typical elevation
61 ft 19 m
most residents: 6–240 ft
Lowest
0 ft 0 m
at sea level on San Rafael Bay
Highest
1,060 ft 325 m
on the northeast side
Average
170 ft 50 m
all land inside city limits
San Rafael spans about 1,060 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 | 61 ft19 m |
| Highest point Inside city limits, on the northeast side | 1,060 ft325 m |
| Lowest point Where the land meets San Rafael Bay | 0 ft0 m |
| Town center USGS map point for San Rafael | 41 ft13 m |
| Average of all land | 170 ft50 m |
| Nearest peak Mount Tamalpais, 4.1 mi southwest of the city limits (NGS survey) | 2,576 ft785 m |
Elevation profile, south to north
4.6 mi south to north through the town center.
Topographic Map
- Location
- City in Marin County, California, United States
- Population
- 59,961 2024 est.
- Land area
- 16.6 sq mi + 6.0 sq mi water
- Density
- 3,615 per sq mi
- Coordinates
- 37.9736° N, 122.5311° W
- Time zone
- Pacific UTC−8 / −7
- Landform region
- Pacific Border
- Drains to
- Pacific Ocean
- ZIP codes 2
- 94901 94903
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Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, USGS
Nearby Places
Nearby towns by typical elevation
- Sleepy Hollow470 ft
- Fairfax220 ft
- Lucas Valley-Marinwood180 ft
- Ross170 ft
- Kentfield130 ft
- San Anselmo120 ft
- Larkspur68 ft
- San Rafael61 ft
- Corte Madera35 ft
- Alto31 ft
- Santa Venetia17 ft
Rankings by typical elevation
- Towns in California1,450th highest of 1,622
- Towns in Marin County26th highest of 31
Peaks and hills nearest, by height
- Mount Veeder2,680 ft
- Mount Tamalpais2,576 ft
- Rocky Ridge2,020 ft
- Vollmer Peak1,916 ft
- Big Rock Ridge1,880 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).
- Pits: the lowest point is the lowest ground outside closed hollows (quarry floors, mine pits, terrain-model artifacts): any hollow under 0.4 sq mi (1 km²), and any hollow under 2 sq mi (5 km²) whose floor is more than 100 ft (30 m) below its rim; and outside patches below sea level of under 0.4 sq mi (1 km²). The single lowest 3DEP cell, −5 ft at 37.9654° N, 122.4671° W, is in such a hollow or patch and is not counted; this coastal land's lowest point is sea level on the coast.
- 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); BTS time zones; NOAA NGS survey heights. All public domain.