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Iowa Physical Map

Iowa’s physical map reveals what flat farmland hides — ancient river drainages, glacial moraines, and dramatic loess bluffs.

Rendered from SRTM 30m elevation data + Natural Earth rivers/lakes + US Census state boundary. Four versions below, all free.

Highest Point

Hawkeye Point

1,670 ft

Lowest Point

Mississippi River

480 ft

Iowa physical map showing the Loess Hills along the Missouri, the Driftless Area, and the broad Prairie Pothole region, with major peaks and cities labeled. Topographic relief from NASA SRTM elevation data.

Choose your version

Two maps, two versions of each.

The same Iowa terrain as a classroom map and as wall art. All four are free PDFs.

Iowa physical map, labeled: the Loess Hills along the Missouri, the Driftless Area, and the broad Prairie Pothole region, with the capital, cities and highest point marked
Labeled
Iowa blank physical map: the same terrain with no labels, for labeling practice
Blank
Physical map

Iowa physical map for the classroom

Elevation in color with shaded relief, plus the surrounding states and water for context. The labeled version marks the capital, major cities and the highest point. The blank version leaves them off so students can label the map themselves.

downloadLabeled PDFdownloadBlank PDF
Iowa relief wall art on a dark background
Dark
Iowa relief wall art on a light background
Light
Wall art

Iowa relief wall art

Iowa on its own, with strong shaded relief and no labels. The dark version has the most contrast. The light version uses far less ink on a home printer.

downloadDark PDFdownloadLight PDF

The physical geography of Iowa

Iowa lies between the Mississippi River on the east and the Missouri and Big Sioux rivers on the west. The north-central part is a flat plain left by the most recent glacier. The south is older, rolling country cut by many streams. Along the Missouri valley in the west stand the Loess Hills, steep ridges of wind-blown silt. The northeast corner escaped the last glaciers and has deep valleys and high bluffs along the Mississippi. Hawkeye Point, the highest spot, is in the northwest.

Major rivers

  • Mississippi
  • Missouri
  • Des Moines
  • Cedar
  • Iowa
  • Big Sioux

Find it on the map

  • Rivers running southeast in parallel toward the Mississippi
  • The Loess Hills along the western edge
  • Deep valleys in the northeast corner
verified

Built from real data, not stock images.

Every Iowa physical map on this page was rendered from NASA SRTM 30-meter elevation data, with hydrography from Natural Earth and the shoreline-clipped state outline from the US Census Bureau. Each map is colored over that state’s own elevation range, and the relief shading is exaggerated so gentle terrain still shows.

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Pair with

map

Iowa political map

The blank outline version of Iowa (state borders, no terrain). Useful for political-geography exercises.

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All physical maps

Browse physical maps for every state, plus continents and the world.

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States that border Iowa

Physical maps of the 6 states that share a border with Iowa.

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The region and the whole country

Map of the Midwest US Regions Map US Physical Map

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