Dare County, NC Elevation & Topographic Map

Topographic elevation map of Dare County, North Carolina, shaded from 3 ft below sea level on the northwest side to 88 ft on Kill Devil Hills
Elevation
88 ft 27 m65 ft 20 m54 ft 16 m31 ft 10 m9 ft 3 m−3 ft −1 m
Zoom in for contour lines
USGS 3DEP · U.S. Census Bureau
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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

Dare County averages about 3 ft (1 m) above sea level across all its land. Its ground runs from 3 ft below sea level on the northwest side to 88 ft on Kill Devil Hills.

Average elevation
3 ft 1 m
all land inside the county
Highest
88 ft 27 m
on Kill Devil Hills
Lowest
−3 ft −1 m
on the northwest side

Dare County spans about 91 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.

5% of Dare County's land lies below the average daily high tide (MHHW, NOAA), and 74% lies less than 3 ft above it. Check flood zones on FEMA's map

FigureElevation
Average of all land3 ft1 m
Highest point
Inside the county, on Kill Devil Hills (3DEP terrain model; no NGS survey height)
88 ft27 m
Lowest point
Inside the county, on the northwest side
−3 ft−1 m

Topographic Map

Topographic elevation map of Dare County, North Carolina, shaded from 3 ft below sea level on the northwest side to 88 ft on Kill Devil Hills
County boundary (dashed) over shaded terrain, with contours every 10 ft (3 m).
Location
County in North Carolina, United States
Population
38,183 2024 est.
Land area
383.2 sq mi + 1,158.5 sq mi water
Density
100 per sq mi
Time zone
Eastern UTC−5 / −4
Landform region
Coastal Plain 94%
Drains to
Atlantic Ocean
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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

Nearby Places

Neighboring counties sharing a border, by average

  1. Currituck County5 ft
  2. Hyde County3 ft
  3. Dare County3 ft
  4. Tyrrell County3 ft

Rankings by average elevation

Peaks and hills highest inside

  • Kill Devil Hills88 ft
  • Engagement Hill56 ft
  • West Hill50 ft
  • Seven Sisters36 ft
  • Creeds Hill34 ft
All 15 towns in Dare County by typical elevation
  1. Nags Head15 ft
  2. Southern Shores11 ft
  3. Kitty Hawk9 ft
  4. Duck9 ft
  5. Kill Devil Hills9 ft
  6. Waves4 ft
  7. Salvo4 ft
  8. Manteo4 ft
  9. Buxton4 ft
  10. Rodanthe4 ft
  11. Avon3 ft
  12. Hatteras3 ft
  13. Frisco2 ft
  14. Wanchese2 ft
  15. Manns Harbor2 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 2 arc-second (≈200 ft, 62 m) grid, coarsened from 1 arc-second so the whole area fits one run. Land means the boundary minus Census area water (on this grid, water areas of at least half a cell).
  • Highest and lowest: the highest land cell, re-read at 1 arc-second around the 25 highest grid cells; 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, re-read at 1 arc-second around the 25 lowest grid cells; 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, −35 ft at 35.8276° N, 75.8090° 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; NOAA tidal surfaces (MHHW). All public domain.