National Map Viewers

The National Map is constantly evolving to incorporate newer and better data and services. Continue to check this page for the latest developments.

Until the new capabilities are implemented, The National Map includes several primary data viewers: the first viewer, The National Map Viewer, has the primary role of viewing distributed data sets from many contributing Federal State and Local Partners through dynamic web map services. The second viewer, The National Map Seamless Server, is the primary site for downloading USGS imagery, elevation and land cover data. To download our most up-to-date National Map road, boundaries, structures and other 'vector' data go to the 'Best Practices' viewer below. To download our full featured National Hydrography data go to the National Hydrography Data (NHD) viewer listed at the bottom of this page. Interactively View National Map Data: The National Map Viewer The National Map Viewer is the face of The National Map and allows the user to interactively view The National Map data as a map, customize the view, and print maps. It provides public access to high-quality geospatial data and information from the eight National Data sets. Map tools allow the user to move around the map, zoom in and out, identify features, and perform other functions. The Viewer currently is undergoing major revisions at: http://nmviewogc.cr.usgs.gov/.

The National Map Seamless Server The National Map Seamless Server enables a user to view and download many geospatial data layers, such as the National Elevation Dataset, the National Land Cover Dataset, high resolution orthoimagery, and other seamless data for the Nation. The Seamless Server can be found at: http://seamless.usgs.gov/.

The National Map 'Best Practices' Viewer The National Map Best Practices viewer contains our most up-to-date vector data for transportation, structures, and governmental units data themes. The USGS is building and maintaining these critical, comprehensive databases to ensure the integration, availability, preservation, and dissemination of geospatial data to serve the natural sciences' and disaster support needs for systematic analyses and investigations. These databases also support the national infrastructure for managing and sharing these types of data at all levels of government. The Best Practices viewer can be found at: http://bpgeo.cr.usgs.gov/viewer.htm.

The National Map 'National Hydrography' Viewer The National Map NHD viewer contains our most up-to-date, full featured hydrography data. The National Hydrography Dataset is a comprehensive set of digital spatial data that contains information about surface water features such as lakes, ponds, streams, rivers, springs and wells. Within the NHD, surface water features are combined to form "reaches," which provide the framework for linking water-related data to the NHD surface water drainage network. These linkages enable the analysis and display of these water-related data in upstream and downstream order. The NHD viewer can be found at: http://nhdgeo.usgs.gov/viewer.htm