Landforms of Saudi Arabia at 30 m: ten classes over 2,296,620,066 cells, with shares per governorate

The whole Saudi land surface classified into ten landforms at 30 m: mountain tops, midslope and valley ridges, upper slopes and mesas, open slopes, plains, broad valleys, upland and midslope drainages, and deeply incised canyons, with a table of each class share and the dominant class per governorate.

Plains cover 79.4% of the Kingdom, peaks, ridges and slopes 12.2% and valleys and drainage lines 8.1%.

Who it is for

Physical geography and geomorphology departments, site and route studies, environmental impact assessment, rangeland and water research, and postgraduate students.

Method: what we add to the raw data

• The source is a recent open global elevation model at 15 m; its bare-earth terrain band was used (not the surface of buildings and trees), prepared for the whole Kingdom at 30 m.
• For every cell, its position relative to two neighbourhoods was computed: a near one of about 150 m radius and a far one of about one kilometre, each being the difference between the cell elevation and the mean around it.
• The slope of each cell in degrees was computed from elevation differences with its neighbours.
• Position in the two neighbourhoods together with slope determines the class: above both is a mountain top, above the near but not the far is a midslope ridge, below both is a deeply incised canyon, and so on across the ten classes standard in quantitative geomorphology.
• Classification thresholds were computed once from a sample spread across the whole Kingdom rather than per processing block, so the same terrain is not classified differently in adjacent blocks and no seams appear.
• The Kingdom was processed block by block with a margin wider than the largest neighbourhood radius, then clipped to the national boundary and class shares summed per governorate.

Product details

Raster files (GeoTIFF)

• D121_landforms_30m.tif — 78,563 × 58,535, 30 m: Landform classes (ten)

Tables

• D121_governorates_landforms.csv — 121 rows: Share of each class and the dominant class per governorate
• D121_national_summary.csv — 10 rows: Share of each class across the Kingdom

Limitations

• The classification describes surface form, not origin: what is called a ridge here may be a dune crest or a rock scarp, told apart by location and geology.
• At 30 m cells, forms smaller than about a hundred metres do not appear, and fine slopes inside cities are smoothed away.
• Thresholds are uniform across the Kingdom, so form in gentle terrain is measured on the same scale as in the Sarawat; this is deliberate, to keep the classification comparable between regions.
• Valleys here are a surface form read from elevation, not channels confirmed by flow; actual watercourses are in the hydrology product.
• The elevation model derives from imagery acquired up to 2024, so later earthworks are not represented.
• The area measured from the boundary used here is 1,925,091 km2, less than the commonly cited official figure of about 2,150,000 km2; the difference is between a declared figure and an area measured from a digital boundary, and the shares should be read on that basis.

FAQ

How long does delivery take?

Up to 6 hours after payment is confirmed.

How long does the download link last?

24 hours, and it is renewed free on request.

Can I get a refund?

Digital products are not refundable once downloaded — unless the file is defective or does not match the description, in which case it is replaced or fully refunded.

What does the licence allow?

Commercial use is allowed for you and the organisation you buy for; resale or redistribution is not.