Philadelphia, PA Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
450 ft 135 m330 ft 100 m280 ft 85 m170 ft 50 m56 ft 17 m0 ft 0 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.
- City area
- Fades everything outside the official city limits (US Census).
Elevation Data
Philadelphia sits at about 96 ft (29 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.
Typical elevation
96 ft 29 m
most residents: 26–230 ft
Lowest
0 ft 0 m
on the southwest side
Highest
450 ft 135 m
on the north side
Average
120 ft 35 m
all land inside city limits
Philadelphia spans about 450 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 | 96 ft29 m |
| Highest point Inside city limits, on the north side | 450 ft135 m |
| Lowest point Inside city limits, on the southwest side | 0 ft0 m |
| Town center USGS map point for Philadelphia | 36 ft11 m |
| Airport (PHL) FAA airport elevation, the highest point of its runways, 0.0 mi southwest of the city limits | 36 ft11 m |
| Average of all land | 120 ft35 m |
Elevation profile, south to north
13 mi south to north through the town center.
Topographic Map
- Location
- Consolidated city and county in Pennsylvania, United States
- Population
- 1,573,916 2024 est.
- Land area
- 134.3 sq mi + 8.1 sq mi water
- Density
- 11,717 per sq mi
- Coordinates
- 39.9523° N, 75.1638° W
- Time zone
- Eastern UTC−5 / −4
- Landform region
- Coastal Plain
- Drains to
- Delaware River → Atlantic Ocean
- Airport
- Philadelphia International (PHL) 36 ft
- ZIP codes 49
49 ZIP codes
19102 19103 19104 19106 19107 19108 19109 19111 19112 19114 19115 19116 19118 19119 19120 19121 19122 19123 19124 19125 19126 19127 19128 19129 19130 19131 19132 19133 19134 19135 19136 19137 19138 19139 19140 19141 19142 19143 19144 19145 19146 19147 19148 19149 19150 19151 19152 19153 19154
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Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, USGS, FAA
Nearby Places
Nearby towns by typical elevation
- Bala Cynwyd280 ft
- East Lansdowne120 ft
- Millbourne110 ft
- Philadelphia96 ft
- Yeadon88 ft
- Haddon Township, NJ45 ft
- Oaklyn, NJ28 ft
- Collingswood, NJ27 ft
- Camden, NJ20 ft
- Gloucester City, NJ17 ft
- Woodlynne, NJ15 ft
Rankings by typical elevation
- Towns in Pennsylvania3,512th highest of 3,545
Peaks and hills nearest, by height
- Camp Hill340 ft
- Fort Hill, Montgomery County290 ft
- Lafayette Hill280 ft
- Georges Hill270 ft
- Lemon Hill140 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, −32 ft at 39.8876° N, 75.1810° W, is in such a hollow or patch and is not counted.
- 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.