Identifying Physical and Human Features Using an Ordnance Survey Map Key

Welcome. This is the first lesson in the Reading Ordnance Survey Maps module. You already feel confident using grid references and contour lines; this lesson adds another essential skill: using the key to translate the symbols you find at those locations.

By the end, you should be able to look at several common OS symbols and name the feature they represent accurately. This matters because a map is not a picture of the landscape: it is a carefully designed code for fitting a great deal of information into a small space.

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Maps use a visual language

An Ordnance Survey (OS) map represents real places with colours, lines, shapes, and abbreviations. If every river, school, road, and wood were written out in full, the map would be far too crowded to read. The map key (also called a legend) is the decoder for that visual language.

Watch this short introduction from Every Ordnance Survey Symbol explained by The Map Reading Company. It explains why map symbols are needed and gives the most important habit for an unfamiliar symbol: check the map’s key.

A key does more than give you a useful answer in the moment. It stops you from guessing. For example, blue often relates to water, but a motorway can also be shown in blue. Colour gives a clue; the complete symbol and its entry in the key give the meaning.

BBC Bitesize gives a concise reminder of the main parts of a map and introduces common OS symbols.

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Three shapes of map information

Before learning individual symbols, notice the form a symbol takes. This is a useful first clue when scanning any map.

Form on the map	What it often represents	Examples in this lesson
Point symbol	A feature at one particular location	campsite, school, post office
Line symbol	A route or feature that continues across the landscape	river, motorway, railway
Area pattern or tint	Land that covers an area	woods

A campsite is marked at one location, so it has a point symbol. A river continues across the land, so it is drawn as a line. Woods spread across an area, so the map uses repeated tree symbols or a green pattern.

This is only a clue, not a replacement for the key. A railway station, for instance, is shown as a point symbol, but it makes most sense when you see it sitting on a railway line.

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Nine common OS symbols

Use the symbol table below as your first small working vocabulary. Keep the meanings precise: saying “road” when the key says “motorway,” or “train” when it says “railway station,” loses useful information.

Symbol clue	Meaning in the key	What to notice
A blue tent-like shape	Campsite	The shape resembles a tent.
A thick blue route with a dashed centre	Motorway	It is a major transport route, not a river.
A narrow black line with small cross-bars	Railway	The cross-bars suggest sleepers on railway tracks.
A yellow circle on a railway	Railway station	The circle marks a stopping place on the rail line.
A winding blue line	River	The bendy shape suggests a watercourse.
Sch	School	A shortened written label is still a map symbol.
A cross above a black circle	Place of worship	Use the key’s wording rather than assuming a particular religion or building type.
P	Post office (rural areas only)	The letter is an abbreviation; the key adds the important rural-area detail.
Green tree symbols over an area	Woods	The repeated pattern shows land covered by trees.

Several of these features are made by people, such as railways, schools, and motorways. Others describe the natural environment or land cover, such as rivers and woods. For now, concentrate on the first question: What does the symbol mean? In the next lesson, you will use that identification to decide systematically whether a feature is physical or human.

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A reliable method for identifying symbols

When you find a symbol on an OS map, use this four-part routine:

1. Describe what you can see. Notice its colour, shape, and whether it is a point, line, or area pattern. For example: “a winding blue line.”
2. Find the matching symbol in the key. Match the whole symbol, not just one feature such as its colour.
3. Say or write the exact key meaning. In this case: “river,” not merely “water.”
4. Check the surrounding map evidence. A station should connect to a railway; woods should cover an area rather than appear as a single tree.

Context is especially helpful with similar-looking transport symbols. A railway station symbol includes a railway line; without that line, treating any yellow circle as a station would be unsafe. Similarly, a motorway and a river may both be blue, but their line styles and the key distinguish them.

A strong map-reading answer is therefore evidence-based:

• “The thick blue line with a dashed centre represents a motorway, according to the key.”
• “The green repeated tree pattern shows woods.”
• “Sch is the abbreviation for a school.”

Avoid relying on an invented meaning simply because a symbol “looks like” something. Visual resemblance is helpful for a campsite or trees, but the key has the final word.

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Build recall without guessing

For a short independent practice routine, use the Common OS map symbols table:

• Cover the meanings column and identify each symbol aloud.
• Uncover the meaning and check your answer.
• If you were wrong, name one visual detail you missed: colour, line style, repeated pattern, or abbreviation.
• Repeat the symbols that were least familiar, especially the difference between railway and railway station, and between river and motorway.

This is more effective than rereading the table several times because it makes you retrieve the meaning from memory, then immediately correct it using the key.

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Key takeaways

• OS maps use symbols so they can show detailed information clearly and compactly.
• The key/legend is the reliable tool for decoding symbols; do not guess from colour alone.
• Symbols can represent a point, a line, or an area.
• Common symbols in this lesson include campsite, motorway, railway, railway station, river, school, place of worship, rural post office, and woods.
• Use exact language from the key and check nearby map evidence when a symbol could be confused with another.

Next lesson, you will take the symbols you can now identify and classify their features as physical or human geography.