US Map / Cities / Winston-Salem

Winston-Salem Map

Winston-Salem is two towns that merged: the Moravian settlement of Salem and the industrial county seat of Winston, joined under a hyphen in 1913.

Where is Winston-Salem?

Winston-Salem is in the northwestern Piedmont of North Carolina, about 30 miles west of Greensboro, roughly 80 miles northeast of Charlotte, and some 105 miles west of Raleigh. Durham is about 80 miles east. The Virginia line is 30 miles north, and the Blue Ridge escarpment rises about 40 miles to the northwest.

Winston-Salem at a glance

Winston-Salem in North Carolina

The city is the seat of Forsyth County, one of 100 counties on the North Carolina county map, and the anchor of the western end of the Piedmont Triad with Greensboro and High Point. North Carolina's top-100 cities — Charlotte, Raleigh, Greensboro, Durham and Winston-Salem — all lie in the same band of Piedmont country between the mountains and the coastal plain, which is where the railroads and later the interstates ran. The North Carolina state page explains the three-part division of the state.

Piedmont hills, the Yadkin and the tobacco years

The land here is rolling Piedmont — worn-down hills on old crystalline rock, rising gradually westward until the Appalachian front appears on the skyline. The Yadkin River runs down the western side of Forsyth County on its way to becoming the Pee Dee and reaching the sea in South Carolina, and Pilot Mountain, an isolated quartzite knob visible for miles, stands to the north. The city's economy was built on tobacco: R. J. Reynolds made Winston a factory town, and when that industry contracted the same campuses were turned over to medicine and research, with Wake Forest University and its medical center now the largest employers. Old Salem, the Moravian half of the city, survives as a preserved district of brick and half-timbered buildings a few blocks south of the modern downtown, so the two towns that merged in 1913 are still visibly different places on the ground.

Cities near Winston-Salem

The other Piedmont cities are Greensboro, Charlotte, Durham and Raleigh; Richmond lies north across the Virginia line. The South Atlantic division page covers the corridor they sit on.