Physical map of China
Physical map of China shows the shape of the land with shaded relief and colors for elevation. Rivers and lakes are drawn in blue, and dashed lines show country borders. Download the labeled map or use the version without names as a worksheet.
How to read this map
Named features on this map include North China Plain, Gobi Desert, Tibetan Plateau, Greater Khingan, Karakoram, Kunlun Mountains, Lesser Khingan, Qilian Mountains, Dabie Mountains, Nanling Mountains, Wuyi Mountains, Altyn-Tagh, Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau, Sichuan Basin, Tarim Basin, Taihang Mountains, Qinling, Dalou Mountains, Borohoro Mountains, Mount Everest, Mount Kailash, Nganglong Mountains. The terrain colors help locate these features within the surrounding lowlands, plateaus and mountain belts.
The mapped river network includes Tuotuo, Nmai, Nanpan, Salween, Tongtian, Nu, Hongshui, Quan. Only selected rivers are labeled at this scale; a missing label does not mean that a river is absent.
Greens show lower elevations; tan and brown show higher land, with pale tones toward the highest terrain. Shadows emphasize the slopes. Vertical relief is exaggerated to make landforms easier to read, so the map is not a slope survey. Blue tones distinguish seas from land; the legend is a guide to land elevation, not a chart of water depth.
The relief uses Terrain Tiles, a composite of SRTM, GMTED2010 and ETOPO1 elevation data distributed through the AWS Open Data program. Boundaries, rivers, lakes and feature names come from Natural Earth. These are small-scale educational maps rather than navigation or engineering surveys.
Blank physical map
The blank version keeps the mapped features and removes the place labels. Download it for a geography worksheet or practice identifying the features.
Features and names
| Reference | Name or description |
|---|---|
| Named physical feature | North China Plain |
| Named physical feature | Gobi Desert |
| Named physical feature | Tibetan Plateau |
| Named physical feature | Greater Khingan |
| Named physical feature | Karakoram |
| Named physical feature | Kunlun Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Lesser Khingan |
| Named physical feature | Qilian Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Dabie Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Nanling Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Wuyi Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Altyn-Tagh |
| Named physical feature | Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau |
| Named physical feature | Sichuan Basin |
| Named physical feature | Tarim Basin |
| Named physical feature | Taihang Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Qinling |
| Named physical feature | Dalou Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Borohoro Mountains |
| Named physical feature | Mount Everest |
| Named physical feature | Mount Kailash |
| Named physical feature | Nganglong Mountains |
Data sources and license
- Natural Earth (public-domain geography): Public domain.
- Terrain Tiles / Mapzen (SRTM, GMTED2010, ETOPO1): Open elevation data; source attribution retained.
Map design and rendered images: Atlas of Maps, CC BY 4.0. Source databases retain their own licenses; the map license does not replace them.
Also see the political map of China, with cities, internal divisions, a location map and printable outline maps.
Frequently asked questions
What does a physical map show?
A physical map shows landforms and water: mountains, plateaus, lowlands, rivers, lakes and seas. This map uses elevation colors and hill shading instead of coloring each country separately.
Can I download physical map of china without labels?
Yes. The blank relief map retains the terrain, rivers and outlines but removes place names. Both versions are available as PNG and PDF; the PDF uses A4 paper and can be scaled to US Letter.
Use this map
You can download, print and share this map for free, in class, in school projects, in presentations and on websites, as long as you credit the source: Physical map of China · Atlas of Maps (atlasofmaps.com), license CC BY 4.0.
More physical maps
- Physical map of the United States
- Physical map of India
- Physical map of the United Kingdom
- Physical map of Mexico
- Physical map of Canada
- Physical map of Australia
- Physical world map
- Physical map of Europe
- Physical map of Asia
- Physical map of Africa
- Physical map of North America
- Physical map of South America
- Physical map of Oceania