HYDROLOGY

Hydrology Software for Watershed & Drainage Analysis

STREAM is hydrology software that models how water moves across your terrain, straight from the DEM. Compute flow direction and accumulation, extract stream networks, and delineate watersheds and basins — all as live layers over the surface.

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Hydrology analysis in STREAM: the derived stream network drawn over the terrain, with flow direction, flow accumulation and stream threshold controls.

What is terrain hydrology analysis?

Hydrology analysis derives how water flows across an elevation surface. Flow direction shows where each cell drains; flow accumulation shows where flow concentrates into channels; watershed delineation groups the area draining to a point.

It is fundamental for drainage design, flood and erosion studies, and catchment planning — all read from the DEM.

Most hydrology software treats flow direction, accumulation and watershed delineation as a module run on data imported from elsewhere. In STREAM these are native operations on the same DEM you already view, edit and export, with no import/export round-trip.

Hydrology Software in STREAM

Flow direction & accumulation

Compute where every cell drains and where flow concentrates into channels across the whole DEM.

Stream networks

Extract the drainage / stream network implied by the terrain.

Watershed & basins

Delineate the catchment area draining to a chosen outlet point.

Live overlays

View results as color layers over the terrain and save them as raster or vector.

How to run a watershed and drainage analysis

1
Set the scope
Draw or select the area the hydrology runs inside, so the calculation covers the catchment you care about.
2
Compute flow direction and accumulation
Flow direction says which way water leaves each cell; accumulation adds up how much drains through it. The stream network comes out of the accumulation threshold you set.
3
Delineate the catchment
Place the outlet point and STREAM traces the area draining to it.
4
Check where water stands
Ponding shows the depressions that fill before they spill, which is what decides where a ditch has to go.
5
Keep or export
Save the stream network and catchment as vectors, the flow rasters as GeoTIFF, and take the figures into the report.

Supported formats

GeoTIFF

Source DEM, and exported hydrology layers (flow, streams, watersheds) as raster

DXF

Hydrology layers exported as vector

Watch it

Stream — Hydrogeology Analysis | Watersheds, Flow & Stream Networks on 3D Terrain

Stream — Ponding Analysis | Where Water Collects, How Deep and How Much

Frequently asked questions

What hydrology tools does STREAM include?

Flow direction, flow accumulation, stream / drainage network extraction and watershed (basin) delineation — all computed on the DEM.

Is hydrology computed from the DEM?

Yes. All hydrology analysis reads the elevation surface directly, so flow and catchments follow the real terrain.

Can I use it for drainage and flood studies?

Yes. Flow accumulation, stream networks and watersheds are the standard inputs for drainage design and erosion / flood analysis.

Is STREAM standalone hydrology software or part of a larger tool?

STREAM bundles flow direction, flow accumulation, stream/drainage network extraction and watershed (basin) delineation into the same native Windows app you use for terrain, DEM and CAD-GIS work — you don't need separate hydrology software.