Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Are there metadata files for USGS topographic maps?

GeoPDF files for both Historical Topographic maps (produced 1884-2006), US Topo maps (produced 2009-present), and OnDemand Topo maps come with an XML metadata file attached to each GeoPDF file. To access the metadata file, download the GeoPDF file, open it in Acrobat Reader, click on the paperclip icon, then select a file from the list that appears (US Topo maps also come with a Map Symbols sheet).

US Topo maps (only) downloaded through TopoView (only) or OnDemand Topos downloaded through topoBuilder in GeoTIFF format come with two metadata XML documents—one for the map and one for the orthoimage.

For Historical Topographic maps and US Topo maps, do a search on the map name and date in ScienceBase (example: Mammoth WV 2014). The entry for each map includes a link to the metadata.

A CSV zip file (for import into spreadsheets) of selected metadata fields for the complete Historical Topographic Map andUS Topo Map collections is refreshed nightly. That file is also posted at the bottom of the Topographic Maps website. The zip file contains files for all current US Topo maps (ustopo_current.zip), all superseded US Topo maps (ustopo_historical.zip) and all maps in the Historical Topographic Map Collection (historicaltopo.zip).

 Learn more: