BC NTS Grid Explained

Most of British Columbia uses the National Topographic System (NTS) to describe land locations — not the DLS (Dominion Land Survey) grid used across the prairies. If you work in BC mining, forestry, oil and gas exploration, or Crown land applications, understanding NTS notation is essential. The Peace River region in the northeast corner of the province is the exception, where DLS applies.

The NTS is a nested hierarchy. Each level subdivides the level above it, getting progressively smaller until you can pin down a location to a fraction of a township-sized block.

The Six Levels of NTS

Map Series

The outermost level. A map series covers a large geographic area — several degrees of latitude and longitude. Series numbers used in BC include 82, 83, 92, 93, 94, 102, 103, and 104. Series 93, for example, covers a large swath of central BC around Prince George. You pick the right series based on which part of the province you're working in.

Map Area

Each series is divided into lettered map areas (A through P, skipping I). These cover roughly one degree of latitude by two degrees of longitude. In practice, a map area is the scale you'd see on a standard provincial overview map. Series 93, Map Area P (93-P) covers the area around Omineca and parts of the Rocky Mountain Trench.

Map Sheet

Each map area contains 16 numbered map sheets (1 through 16), numbered in a specific pattern from bottom-left to top-right in four rows. Map sheets are the standard 1:50,000 scale topographic maps published by Natural Resources Canada. 93-P-8 identifies a single NTS map sheet.

Block

Each map sheet is divided into 12 blocks labeled A through L (skipping I), arranged in three rows of four, reading left to right from bottom to top. Blocks are large enough to cover significant terrain — forests, watersheds, mineral claim areas.

Unit

Each block contains a 10×10 grid of 100 units, numbered 1 through 100. Units are numbered starting from the bottom-left, running right across each row, then up to the next row. Unit 1 is bottom-left, unit 10 is bottom-right, unit 11 starts the second row from the left.

Quarter Unit

The smallest division. Each unit is split into four quarter units labeled A, B, C, and D. Quarter A is the southwest quarter, B is the southeast, C is the northeast, and D is the northwest — following a counterclockwise pattern starting from the southwest.

Reading the Notation

A full NTS reference looks like this: A-2-F/93-P-8

Breaking it down from right to left (largest to smallest):

• 93 — Map Series
• P — Map Area
• 8 — Map Sheet
• F — Block
• 2 — Unit
• A — Quarter Unit

Reading left to right, you move from the most specific location (quarter unit A) up through each containing division to the broadest area (series 93). The slash separates the smaller subdivisions from the larger sheet reference.

Some references omit the quarter unit when only unit-level precision is needed: 2-F/93-P-8.

Where NTS Is Used in BC

Mining and mineral claims: The BC mineral tenure system historically used NTS grid references for staking claims and describing tenure boundaries. Many legacy mining documents still carry NTS coordinates.

Forestry: Timber supply areas, cutblock locations, and forest inventory records frequently use NTS references, particularly in northern and central BC.

Oil and gas (northeast BC): While the Peace River area uses DLS, adjacent areas in the foothills and Rocky Mountain Trench use NTS. Exploration permits and well locations in these zones reference NTS grid coordinates.

Crown land applications: Tenure applications for backcountry recreation, range use, and other provincial land uses often require NTS coordinates to define the application area.

Converting NTS References

Working with NTS coordinates becomes much faster with a dedicated tool. The BC NTS converter takes any NTS reference and returns the corresponding latitude and longitude — no manual chart reading required.

For background on converting NTS to GPS coordinates, the NTS to GPS converter guide walks through the process in detail. If you need to convert multiple references at once, batch conversion handles lists of NTS coordinates in a single pass.

For definitions of NTS terminology and related land description terms, see the glossary. The about page covers how Township Canada handles BC land data.

Convert any NTS reference on the BC NTS converter — paste in a reference and get coordinates back immediately.