A graph showing the change in water surface area or water volume with depth. Widely used in lake fisheries.     The depth of the lake is plotted on the negative ordinate axis and the area on the positive abscissa axis. And hypsographic curves can be plotted: by absolute values of depth and area; lake area as a percentage and depth as an absolute value. lake area and depth as a percentage.

A bathymetric curve is a subset or type of hypsographic curve that shows the percentage of the ocean or seabed at different depths.