Cary, NC Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
520 ft 160 m450 ft 135 m410 ft 125 m340 ft 105 m270 ft 80 m230 ft 70 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.
- Town area
- Fades everything outside the official town limits (US Census).
Elevation Data
Cary sits at about 390 ft (120 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.
Typical elevation
390 ft 120 m
most residents: 310–460 ft
Lowest
230 ft 70 m
on the west side
Highest
520 ft 160 m
near the middle
Average
380 ft 115 m
all land inside town limits
Cary spans about 290 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 | 390 ft120 m |
| Highest point Inside town limits, near the middle | 520 ft160 m |
| Lowest point Inside town limits, on the west side | 230 ft70 m |
| Town center USGS map point for Cary | 490 ft150 m |
| Airport (RDU) FAA airport elevation, the highest point of its runways, 0.9 mi north of the town limits | 435 ft133 m |
| Average of all land | 380 ft115 m |
Elevation profile, south to north
11 mi south to north through the town center.
Topographic Map
- Location
- Town in Wake, Chatham and Durham counties, North Carolina, United States
- Population
- 182,659 2024 est.
- Land area
- 61.4 sq mi + 1.1 sq mi water
- Density
- 2,977 per sq mi
- Coordinates
- 35.7915° N, 78.7811° W
- Time zone
- Eastern UTC−5 / −4
- Landform region
- Piedmont
- Drains to
- Neuse River → Atlantic Ocean
- Airport
- Raleigh-Durham International (RDU) 435 ft
- ZIP codes 9
- 27511 27513 27518 27519 27523 27539 27560 27606 27607
⤓ 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
- Governors Club400 ft
- Cary390 ft
- Fuquay-Varina380 ft
- Holly Springs380 ft
- Apex370 ft
- Durham350 ft
- Morrisville340 ft
- Raleigh320 ft
- Garner320 ft
- Governors Village280 ft
- Carolina Meadows280 ft
Rankings by typical elevation
- Towns in North Carolina362nd highest of 782
- Towns in Wake Countyhighest of 12
Peaks and hills nearest, by height
- Edwards Mountain660 ft
- Bennett Mountain610 ft
- Red Hill, Chatham County600 ft
- Boothe Hill600 ft
- High Hill, Orange County470 ft
How we measure
- Typical elevation: the population-weighted median: every 2020 Census block inside the town 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 town 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. All public domain.