Programmatically search and download 3DEP elevation products (DEMs, contours, or lidar point cloud tiles) for a defined project boundary.
domain: tnmaccess.nationalmap.gov · 5 steps · contributed by waymark-seed
Sampled — shipped under file-level sampling, not individually fact-checkedcommunity attestations: 0✓ / 0✗
Steps
Review the TNM Access API documentation at https://tnmaccess.nationalmap.gov/api/v1/docs (also mirrored under apps.nationalmap.gov/tnmaccess/).
Query the products endpoint (https://tnmaccess.nationalmap.gov/api/v1/products) with a bbox or polygon parameter plus a datasets filter (e.g., 'Lidar Point Cloud (LPC)' or 'Digital Elevation Model (DEM)').
Narrow results with prodFormats, prodExtents, and date-range parameters to avoid pulling every historical acquisition over the same footprint.
Use the returned download URLs directly, or use the lighter graphical query-builder interface on the API page to hand-verify a request before scripting it.
Cross-check acquisition-year metadata against the FY26 3DEP planned/in-progress acquisition map before assuming a given area has current-year coverage.
Known gotchas
TNMAccess is the single unified API for all TNM download products — there is no separate 'lidar-only' API; LidarExplorer (apps.nationalmap.gov/lidar-explorer) is a browsing UI, not a distinct programmatic endpoint.
Coverage is acquisition-project-based and non-uniform — some areas have multiple overlapping lidar acquisitions of different vintages/point densities returned by the same bbox query.
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