Watertown, MA Elevation & Topographic Map

Topographic elevation map of Watertown, Massachusetts, shaded from 1 ft on the southeast side to 230 ft on Meetinghouse Hill
Elevation
230 ft 70 m170 ft 50 m140 ft 45 m86 ft 26 m29 ft 9 m1 ft 0 m
Contours every 100 ft, bold every 500 ft
USGS 3DEP · U.S. Census Bureau
⤓ Download this map
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

Watertown sits at about 51 ft (16 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.

Typical elevation
51 ft 16 m
most residents: 28–120 ft
Lowest
1 ft 0 m
on the southeast side
Highest
230 ft 70 m
on Meetinghouse Hill
Average
63 ft 19 m
all land inside city limits

Watertown spans about 229 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.

FigureElevation
Typical
Where people live: half of residents higher, half lower
51 ft16 m
Highest point
Inside city limits, on Meetinghouse Hill
230 ft70 m
Lowest point
Inside city limits, on the southeast side
1 ft0 m
Town center
USGS map point for Watertown
60 ft18 m
Airport (BOS)
FAA airport elevation, the highest point of its runways, 6.9 mi east of the city limits
19 ft6 m
Average of all land63 ft19 m

Elevation profile, south to north

1.4 mi south to north through the town center.

Topographic Map

Topographic elevation map of Watertown, Massachusetts, shaded from 1 ft on the southeast side to 230 ft on Meetinghouse Hill
City limits (dashed) over shaded terrain, with contours every 20 ft (6 m).
Location
City in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States
Population
35,985 2024 est.
Land area
4.0 sq mi + 0.1 sq mi water
Density
9,005 per sq mi
Coordinates
42.3709° N, 71.1828° W
Time zone
Eastern UTC−5 / −4
Landform region
New England
Drains to
Atlantic Ocean
Airport
General Edward Lawrence Logan International (BOS) 19 ft
⤓ Download this map

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

  1. Lexington220 ft
  2. Newton120 ft
  3. Arlington100 ft
  4. Waltham86 ft
  5. Belmont72 ft
  6. Winchester72 ft
  7. Brookline57 ft
  8. Watertown51 ft
  9. Somerville38 ft
  10. Medford22 ft
  11. Cambridge14 ft

Rankings by typical elevation

Peaks and hills nearest, by height

  • Monadnock Mountain3,170 ft
  • North Pack Monadnock Mountain2,260 ft
  • Crotched Mountain2,063 ft
  • Meetinghouse Hill, Middlesex County230 ft
  • Coolidge Hill, Middlesex County120 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); FAA airport data; BTS time zones; NOAA NGS survey heights. All public domain.