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New Lidar Coverage in World Elevation Layers – Oct 2025

By Rajinder Nagi

The ArcGIS Living Atlas of the World provides foundational elevation layers and tools to support analysis and visualization across the ArcGIS system. These layers are updated quarterly with high-resolution elevation data from federal agencies, open sources, and the Community Maps Program. Esri offers these datasets as ready-to-use services that benefit the GIS community and extend the use of data in new and innovative ways. In this release, World Elevation Layers have been updated with numerous lidar-derived high-resolution Digital Terrain Models (DTMs).

Terrain and TopoBathy layers are updated with:

  • DGT’s lidar-derived 50-centimeter DTMs covering mainland Portugal, excluding the northwest zone, which is not yet available.
  • ČUZK’s lidar-derived 2-meter DTMs covering the entire Czech Republic.
  • Lidar-derived 1-meter DTMs covering Moreton Bay City, Australia.
  • Land Information New Zealand’s (LINZ) lidar-derived 1-meter DTMs covering partial areas of New Zealand. This release adds approximately 40,400 sq km (~15,600 sq mi) of new data, bringing total coverage to ~225,000 sq km (~86,900 sq mi), as shown in the map below.
New Zealand 1m coverage as of October 2025
  • Expanded coverage of USGS 3DEP 1-meter lidar-derived DTMs for areas of the conterminous United States. This release adds approximately 133,420 sq km (~51,510 sq mi) of new coverage, as shown in the map below.
USGS 3DEP 1m coverage as of October 2025
  • The latest USGS 1/3 arc-second (~10 meters) seamless DEM dataset for the United States, covering the 48 conterminous states, Hawaii, Alaska, and U.S. territories.
  • The latest USGS 1 arc-second (~30 meters) seamless DEM dataset for the conterminous United States, Alaska, Hawaii, Canada, and Mexico.

Ready-To-Use Elevation Tools:

Ready-To-Use Elevation Tools (ProfileViewshed and Summarize Elevation) have also been updated with the latest USGS 3DEP 1/3 arc-second and 1 arc-second datasets.

Let’s explore a few examples that highlight the improvements.

The historic city of Coimbra depicted with lidar derived 50 centimeters data in comparison to 24 meters WorldDEM4Ortho
Coimbra, Portugal – The historic city depicted with lidar-derived 50-centimeter data compared to 24-meter WorldDEM4Ortho.
Prague - capital and largest city of the Czech Republic depicted with lidar derived 2 meters data in comparison to 24 meters WorldDEM4Ortho
Prague, Czech Republic – The capital and largest city depicted with lidar-derived 2-meter data compared to 24-meter WorldDEM4Ortho.
Whitehall Quarry near Cambridge depicted with LINZ’s lidar derived 1 meter in comparison to 24 meters WorldDEM4Ortho
Cambridge, New Zealand – Whitehall Quarry near Cambridge depicted with LINZ’s lidar-derived 1-meter data compared to 24-meter WorldDEM4Ortho.
Punchbowl Crater, an extinct volcanic tuff cone and surroundings depicted with USGS’s lidar derived 3DEP 1 meter in comparison to 3DEP 10 meters
Honolulu, Hawaii, USA – Punchbowl Crater, an extinct volcanic tuff cone, depicted with USGS’s lidar-derived 3DEP 1-meter data compared to 3DEP 10-meter.

These data updates are tentatively scheduled to be rolled out to the world elevation tiled services, including Elevation 3D (Terrain3D and TopoBathy3D) and Hillshade (World Hillshade and World Hillshade (Dark)), by the end of the next quarter.

To view the coverage extents of each source comprising the World Elevation services, check out the World Elevation Coverage Map.

You can help in improving these services by contributing high-resolution elevation data to Living Atlas of the World. To participate and learn more, check out the Esri Community Maps for Elevation program.

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