"}],"short_description":"Spatial Analyst in ArcGIS Pro 3.5 offers a new surface analysis tool, as well improved distance, overlay, and zonal analysis capabilities.","flexible_content":[{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":"The Spatial Analyst extension<\/a> introduces new and enhanced capabilities in ArcGIS Pro 3.5. Highlights in this release include a new tool for surface analysis and some significant performance gains. Along with those comes several other improvements in capability. Read on to learn more.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n ArcGIS Pro 3.5 was released in May 13, 2025.<\/p>\n For an overview of the changes that have been made for this release, have a look at the Your ArcGIS Pro Update (May 2025)<\/a> blog post and video.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Here are the primary areas of improvements over the last release:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Read on to learn more about the specific changes in various areas.<\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" For the Distance Accumulation<\/a> and Distance Allocation<\/a> tools, performance in some scenarios that use the Vertical Factor<\/strong> or Horizontal Factor<\/strong> parameters improved in ArcGIS Pro 3.5. In previous releases, while many scenarios performed well, certain input data characteristics could result in slow processing times. The changes we implemented in this release to address the issue resulted in those scenarios running up to 50 times faster.<\/p>\n The same updates made for the geoprocessing tools also apply to the corresponding raster functions.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The generalization tools Expand<\/a> and Shrink<\/a> have a small improvement that minimizes instances of cut-off cells appearing in the results for some narrow, wedge-shaped zones.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Locate Regions<\/a> tool now now runs on average twice as fast as before, and in some cases up to seven times faster. The primary application of this tool is to find the best locations from a suitability map that meets a subject’s specific spatial requirements. However, this tool is CPU intensive, particularly as the number of seed locations and the resolution of growth parameters increase. For one input raster, the time taken to produce a result went from 28 minutes down to 4 minutes.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A new parameter is available for the Create Accuracy Assessment Points<\/a> tool, which you can use to create randomly sampled points for post classification accuracy assessment. The Minimum Point Distance<\/strong> parameter allows you to set a minimum distance between the reference points.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" An new tool was added to the collection of tools that identify specific landscape characteristics of a surface raster at multiple scales. The Multiscale Surface Deviation<\/a> tool calculates for each input cell the maximum surface deviation from the mean value across a range of spatial scales. One output records what this value is, and the other the scale at which it occurs. This new tool can also take advantage of GPU hardware, and could produce an output up to twice as fast compared to only using the CPU for calculations.<\/p>\n The following graphic illustrates the results from this new tool. The panel on the left is the input elevation surface raster. The middle panel is the output deviation raster. The ridges (darker blue shades) show larger positive deviations from the mean, while the valleys (darker brown shades) show larger negative deviation values. The panel on the right is the scale output. The white areas show locations of larger deviation values found at the larger scales. The darker areas show where larger deviation values found at smaller scales.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"image","image":{"ID":2783422,"id":2783422,"title":"arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation","filename":"arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","filesize":67015,"url":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","link":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/products\/arcgis-pro\/analytics\/whats-new-for-spatial-analyst-in-arcgis-pro-3-5\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3-5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation","alt":"Input raster and two outputs from the Multiscale Surface Deviation tool in ArcGIS Spatial Analyst 3.5","author":"4051","description":"Spatial Analyst extension What's New for ArcGIS Pro 3.5 blog post for the Multiscale Surface Deviation tool","caption":"Input raster and two outputs from the Multiscale Surface Deviation tool in ArcGIS Spatial Analyst 3.5","name":"arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3-5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":2769302,"date":"2025-05-06 06:30:41","modified":"2025-05-06 06:34:05","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":824,"height":378,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation-213x200.jpg","thumbnail-width":213,"thumbnail-height":200,"medium":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","medium-width":464,"medium-height":213,"medium_large":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":352,"large":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","large-width":824,"large-height":378,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","1536x1536-width":824,"1536x1536-height":378,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","2048x2048-width":824,"2048x2048-height":378,"card_image":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","card_image-width":824,"card_image-height":378,"wide_image":"https:\/\/www.esri.com\/arcgis-blog\/app\/uploads\/2025\/05\/arcgis-pro-spatial-analyst-whats-new-3.5-card-surface-surface-multiscale-surface-deviation.jpg","wide_image-width":824,"wide_image-height":378}},"image_position":"center","orientation":"horizontal","hyperlink":""},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" You can use these deviations and scale raster to validate hydrologic features from your surface data.<\/span><\/p>\n Learn more in the Analyze terrain with the new Multiscale Surface tools in ArcGIS<\/a> blog post by Sydney Walker<\/a>.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n The Geomorphon Landforms<\/a> surface tool is a very effective way to analyze terrain for applications from hydrologic studies to assessing landslide susceptibility. In this release, a new How Geomorphon Landforms works<\/a> help topic provides more information to help you better understand it calculates the output values and how to correlate those to common land form types.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" For the Zonal Statistics<\/a> and Zonal Statistics as Table<\/a> tools, the default cell size behavior was updated.<\/p>\n These tools have an input that defines the shape of the zones, and an input that defines the values that will be measured within those zones. By default, these tools now apply the cell size of the value raster to a raster zone input. This follows a change made for feature zone inputs in an earlier release.<\/p>\n Since the value raster is the primary raster to drive the output results, this update will make the analysis more accurate. To modify the default behavior, use the Cell Size<\/strong> environment to specify a number, a raster dataset, or the Maximum of Inputs<\/strong> or Minimum of Inputs<\/strong> options.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n When doing raster analysis, it is important to pay attention to how the environment affects the analysis. In ArcGIS Pro 3.5, tools that honor the Cell Size<\/a> environment support an empty option in both tool dialog boxes and the Python environment. This environment sets the output raster resolution in which the analysis will be performed.<\/p>\n It can be set to match another raster dataset, a numeric value, or to apply the maximum (coarsest) or minimum (finest) resolution of the inputs. The new default behavior enables tools that use\u00a0Maximum of Inputs<\/strong> or another special setting as the default to continue to do so.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n While there is no new functionality specific to the Suitability Modeler, a new capability is available in ArcGIS Pro that you can apply to suitability analysis. Use the new Assign Weights by Pairwise Comparison<\/a> tool in the Analysis toolbox, to calculate weights for a series of input variables more objectively. You can then enter them as as the weight criteria<\/a> when preparing the suitability map<\/p>\n While not a Spatial Analyst tool specifically, the Raster to Polygon<\/a> tool is commonly used in workflows that produce an output as a polygon feature layer. This tool has enhanced performance when vectorizing large rasters. Depending on the data and the settings used, the conversion typically completes in less than half the time as before. In some cases, it can be dramatically faster. For example, the time the tool took to convert one raster went from 2 hours down to about 6 minutes.<\/p>\n Learn more in the Vectorize large rasters efficiently in ArcGIS Pro 3.5<\/a> blog post by Steve Lynch.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n"},{"acf_fc_layout":"content","content":" We hope that you try out the new and improved things you can do with the Spatial Analyst toolbox for ArcGIS Pro 3.5.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We update this link with new posts, so it is worth bookmarking:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n If you have more questions, join in on the discussion on the Community page for Spatial Analyst here:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n To learn more about Spatial Analyst, here are some starting points:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Visit the ArcGIS Pro<\/a> page or the What\u2019s New<\/a> documentation for more information about this release. If you have any questions, you can post in the ArcGIS Pro board in Esri Community<\/a><\/p>\n\n
What\u2019s changed for Spatial Analyst?<\/h2>\n
\n
1. Distance analysis<\/h3>\n
2. Generalization analysis<\/h3>\n
3. Overlay analysis<\/h3>\n
4. Segmentation and Classification analysis<\/h3>\n
5. Surface analysis<\/h3>\n
Multiscale surface analysis<\/h4>\n
Geomorphons<\/h4>\n
6. Zonal analysis<\/h3>\n
7. Cell Size analysis environment<\/h3>\n
8. Suitability Modeler<\/h3>\n
<\/h3>\n
9. Data conversion<\/h3>\n
Summary<\/h2>\n
\n
\n
\n