Union County, IL Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
1,030 ft 315 m850 ft 260 m760 ft 235 m590 ft 180 m410 ft 125 m320 ft 95 m
Contours every 500 ft, bold every 2,500 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.
- County area
- Fades everything outside the official county boundary (US Census).
Elevation Data
Union County averages about 500 ft (155 m) above sea level across all its land. Its ground runs from 320 ft on the southwest side to 1,031 ft on Bald Knob.
Average elevation
500 ft 155 m
all land inside the county
Highest
1,031 ft 314 m
on Bald Knob
Lowest
320 ft 95 m
on the southwest side
Union County spans about 710 ft of height, so no single spot tells the whole story. The ruler shows where most of its land lies, and where the other numbers you'll see come from.
| Figure | Elevation |
|---|---|
| Average of all land | 500 ft155 m |
| Highest point Inside the county, on Bald Knob (NGS survey height) | 1,031 ft314 m |
| Lowest point Inside the county, on the southwest side | 320 ft95 m |
Elevation profile, south to north
18 mi south to north through Anna.
Topographic Map
- Location
- County in Illinois, United States
- Population
- 16,886 2024 est.
- Land area
- 413.4 sq mi + 8.7 sq mi water
- Density
- 41 per sq mi
- Time zone
- Central UTC−6 / −5
- Landform regions
- Interior Low Plateaus 63%, Ozark Plateaus 34%
- Drains to
- Gulf of America
⤓ Download this map
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Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, USGS
Nearby Places
Neighboring counties sharing a border, by average
- Perry County, MO550 ft
- Union County500 ft
- Johnson County500 ft
- Williamson County470 ft
- Cape Girardeau County, MO460 ft
- Jackson County460 ft
- Alexander County390 ft
- Pulaski County360 ft
Rankings by average elevation
- Counties in Illinois77th highest of 102
- Counties in the United States2,320th highest of 3,151
Peaks and hills highest inside
- Bald Knob, Union County1,031 ft
- Hamburg Hill900 ft
- Tiptop Knob890 ft
- Government Rock820 ft
- Pine Knob820 ft
How we measure
- Average: every USGS 3DEP bare-earth cell of land inside the Census county boundary (TIGER/Line, Jan 1 2026), weighted equally, on a 1 arc-second (≈100 ft, 30 m) grid. Land means the boundary minus Census area water.
- Highest and lowest: the highest land cell; it is a named summit, so its height is the peak method: the 3DEP top on a ~7 ft (2 m) window, or the NGS published height when a survey mark sits within 160 ft (50 m) of it. Lowest: the lowest land cell; coastal ground within 3 ft (1 m) of named tidal water counts as sea level.
- 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, 260 ft at 37.3690° N, 89.2438° W, is in such a hollow or patch and is not counted.
- Nearby Places: neighboring counties and rankings use each one's average elevation, on its own grid, the same figure its page shows. Peaks and hills: the highest summits inside the county with at least 980 ft (300 m) of prominence, then the highest federal (GNIS) summits inside it 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).
- Towns: each town's typical elevation (population-weighted median of its own 2020 blocks at 1 arc-second); a town is listed when any of its 2020 residents live in the county.
- 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 (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 (TIGER boundaries and water, 2020 blocks, 2024 population estimates, county adjacency); NOAA NGS survey heights; BTS time zones. All public domain.