Mapping & Survey
Area Calculator
Draw or enter a survey area on the map — get area and perimeter.
Planning aid only — not certified flight-planning software or airspace clearance. Always verify results against your own aircraft's manual and check current regulations before flying. Full disclaimer.
Click the map to place each corner of your survey area, in order.
0 points placed
Area is computed with a local flat-earth projection centered on your polygon — accurate for survey-sized areas (a drone mission site), not intended for country-sized shapes.
Two ways to enter a site
- Draw on the map. Click each corner of the site in order around the boundary. Area and perimeter update with each point; three points is the minimum. Use Undo last point to fix a misplaced corner.
- Enter coordinates. Paste one
latitude, longitudepair per line, in decimal degrees and in order around the boundary. Lines that can't be read are skipped, and the counter tells you how many points were accepted. If your coordinates are in degrees-minutes-seconds or UTM, convert them first with the Coordinate Converter.
You don't need to repeat the first point at the end; the shape is closed automatically.
Units at a glance
The result is shown in square metres, hectares, acres and square feet, with the perimeter in metres and feet.
| Unit | Equals |
|---|---|
| 1 hectare (ha) | 10,000 m², about 2.47 acres |
| 1 acre | about 4,047 m², about 0.405 ha |
| 1 km² | 100 ha |
| A football pitch (105 × 68 m) | about 0.71 ha |
From area to a flight plan
Area alone tells you roughly how big the job is. As an example, take a 10 ha square site mapped with a DJI Mavic 3 Pro from 80 m, with 80% front and 70% side overlap:
- flight lines about 35 m apart, so 10 lines of about 316 m each;
- about 3.2 km of flight lines, or about 6.6 minutes at 8 m/s, before turns;
- about 180 photos.
The Coverage Calculator does this for your own camera, height and overlap. It assumes a roughly square site. For long, narrow or irregular sites, the Mission Planner works from the shape you draw and gives a more realistic line count and distance.
Practical tips for survey boundaries
Extend beyond the area you need. Photogrammetry results are weakest at the edges, where each point is seen in fewer photos. Many pilots extend the flight area by about one flight-line spacing beyond the boundary so the area that matters is well covered.
Mind the slope. The calculator gives the horizontal (map) area, which is what a site plan shows. On sloping ground the actual surface is larger: about 6% larger on a 20° slope and about 15% larger on a 30° slope. The flight is planned on the horizontal area, but surface-based measurements, such as the amount of material to cover a slope, need the larger figure.
Plan batteries per block. If the flight time for the whole site is more than one battery can safely fly, split it into sections you can finish on one battery each, overlapping neighbouring sections slightly. Check the wind for the day first: flight lines flown into a headwind take longer, and the Flight Window shows whether the wind will stay steady through the survey.
Check the boundary against airspace. A site near an airport or a restricted area may need permission for part of it. Our Airspace & no-fly zones page links to the official tools.
Accuracy
The area is calculated on a flat local projection centred on your shape. For survey-sized sites, up to several kilometres across, the error from this simplification is well within 1%, much less than the uncertainty in clicking corners on a map. For legal boundaries or contract quantities, use surveyed coordinates rather than points clicked on satellite imagery.