Roanoke, VA Elevation & Topographic Map
Elevation
1,750 ft 535 m1,530 ft 465 m1,430 ft 435 m1,210 ft 370 m990 ft 305 m890 ft 270 m
Contours every 200 ft, bold every 1,000 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
Roanoke sits at about 1,040 ft (315 m) above sea level, worked out from 2020 Census block heights on USGS 3DEP, weighted by residents.
Typical elevation
1,040 ft 315 m
most residents: 960–1,120 ft
Lowest
890 ft 270 m
on the east side
Highest
1,749 ft 533 m
on Mill Mountain
Average
1,060 ft 325 m
all land inside city limits
Roanoke spans about 860 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 | 1,040 ft315 m |
| Highest point Inside city limits, on Mill Mountain | 1,749 ft533 m |
| Lowest point Inside city limits, on the east side | 890 ft270 m |
| Town center USGS map point for Roanoke | 920 ft280 m |
| Airport (ROA) FAA airport elevation, the highest point of its runways | 1,175 ft358 m |
| Average of all land | 1,060 ft325 m |
| Nearest peak Catawba Mountain, 5.2 mi northwest of the city limits | 3,180 ft970 m |
Elevation profile, south to north
6.7 mi south to north through the town center.
Topographic Map
- Location
- Independent city in Virginia, United States
- Population
- 97,912 2024 est.
- Land area
- 42.5 sq mi + 0.3 sq mi water
- Density
- 2,303 per sq mi
- Coordinates
- 37.2710° N, 79.9414° W
- Time zone
- Eastern UTC−5 / −4
- Landform region
- Valley and Ridge
- Drains to
- Roanoke River → Atlantic Ocean
- Airport
- Roanoke/Blacksburg Regional (Woodrum Field) (ROA) 1,175 ft
- ZIP codes 10
- 24011 24012 24013 24014 24015 24016 24017 24018 24019 24022
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Sources: U.S. Census Bureau, USGS, FAA
Nearby Places
Nearby towns by typical elevation
- Blue Ridge1,360 ft
- Daleville1,340 ft
- Laymantown1,270 ft
- Cloverdale1,270 ft
- Cave Spring1,180 ft
- Glenvar1,130 ft
- Hollins1,110 ft
- Salem1,100 ft
- Vinton1,080 ft
- Stewartsville1,040 ft
- Roanoke1,040 ft
Rankings by typical elevation
- Towns in Virginia213th highest of 700
Peaks and hills nearest, by height
- Poor Mountain3,920 ft
- Cahas Mountain3,562 ft
- Fort Lewis Mountain3,280 ft
- Catawba Mountain3,180 ft
- Foster Knob2,560 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, ZIP code areas); FAA airport data; BTS time zones; NOAA NGS survey heights. All public domain.