Aster because it is available freely with 30 m resolution. I do not think SRTM is of 30 m for every regions. 

SRTM is better than ASTER, it is available freely with 30 m spatial resolution at Earthexplorer for wholw globe.

http://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/

What about quality features other than resolution and availability? Errors due to undetected canyons/deep narrow valleys in mountains and variations in vegetation canopy cover elevations exceeding those of the terrain in plains? And how easy is it to correct or repair SRTM versus Aster for such errors.

Dear Sir ASTER is a 15 m resolution data and SRTM is 3 arc second (90m) so certainly ASTER is better, we have developed set methodoology and was quite successful. Please let me knwo if any help is required. You can download some papers on thsi aspect and report if you wish.

I'd say that from working with it in forested areas, ASTER has more small errors in topography than the latest SRTM DEM version.  It would be nice to use one to correct the other.  So I'd say download both and compare for your region.  Neither is perfect--often the SRTM DEM is a DSM, not a DTM, for example.  

 I think SRTM is much better than DEM, because it presents more details and now there is  new version of SRTM 1-arc available at  http://earthexplorer.usgs.gov/ for all the world.

There is no absolute answer. The main difference between SRTM and ASTER GDEM is the mesh size since SRTM is generally available with a 90 m mesh, but the mesh size is not the resolution. Note that both DTMs have a bias due to vegetation (elevation is given on the top of canopy). There are so many criteria (position bias and accuracy, resolution, slope accuracy, drainage network positional accuracy and topological consistency etc. as well as a variety of fractal or spectral indicators) that it is impossible to give a general answer. I agree with Matthew E Fagan : download both DTMs and test them in your study area, after defining the quality criteria you are interested in.  The attached paper suggests several criteria for the comparison of two elevation data bases.

Article Digital elevation model validation with no ground control: A...

I've had pretty bad experiences with ASTER for landscape archaeology and erosion modelling: large artefacts (mainly peaks) particularly in flat terrain which are very difficult to remove through filtering.

I eventually settled with 90m SRTM data, but recently 30m resolution data has been made available for much of Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas, Oceania and Australia. It's not free from artefacts either, but if you're familiar with GRASS GIS or GDAL there's a fantastic "mdenoise" module/utility which does a great job of removing noise while preserving sharp features like ridge lines and valleys.

GRASS r.denoise module: 

http://grass.osgeo.org/grass64/manuals/addons/r.denoise.html

Denoising algorithm: 

http://personalpages.manchester.ac.uk/staff/neil.mitchell/mdenoise/

USGS/NASA SRTM press releases:

http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2014-321

http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article_pf.asp?ID=4068

http://www.usgs.gov/newsroom/article_pf.asp?ID=4109

Check out ACE2, it is a SRTM grid augmented with airborne and other local data. It does not feature nan values over land and has the same resolution of SRTM. They also provide standard deviation grids to check the quality.

http://tethys.eaprs.cse.dmu.ac.uk/ACE2

Thanks a lot  Robbi Bishop for fruitful explanation.

 Dear Saifuddin,

Please send me some paper in my email:[email protected]   

Also send me your paper on Aravalli mapping of Thrusts may be 2000 publication year. 

Laurent Polidori and Mathew.E Fagan thanks for suggesting use of both and find which one best suitable for my study.

ASTER is better then SRTM according resolution.

if you r working for Indian continent then may go for Cartosat DEM with better resolution following link (http://bhuvan.nrsc.gov.in/data/download/index.php)

It depends on the region that you are interested in and the issue, but, in general terms I vote for SRTM (but, notice that it is like a world picture 10+ years old). I tested SRTM versión 4.1 for PERU.

As several answers voted for SRTM, I would like to add another vote for SRTM base on our study conducted in forest environment. In the study, we compared the performance of ASTER GDEM2 and SRTM.

Conference Paper Accuracy assessment of global topographic data (SRTM & ASTER...

It depends on the size of the study area. If you want to make a study of regional scale SRTM is for sure better. But if you want to study of local scale them ASTER is better.

SRTM is better

Depends on scale, location and physical landscape characteristics of your study area. But generally STRM is better. 

STRM is the best for elevation.

Getting in really late on this, but it really depends what you want to do with the data... STRM is best if what you're looking for is only great resolution in the vertical scale. ASTER's plus point is 1-arc minute coverage of basically everywhere. If you're doing very local scale studies then you might consider ASTER for its better horizontal resolution (unless you're in a position where you have 1-arc second STRM coverage).

SRTM is better for topographical mapping 

No doubt SRTM is better than ASTER but Newly released Database Of ALOS Japanese satellite is also providing DSM of 30m resolution that will help you...

Regards....

For rainfall-runoff modeling ALOS is better or SRTM??

Hi

Based on My Experiences and researches in Hydrological and Hydraulic Modeling, the results of ALOS dataset is more better than SRTM, specially in flood inundation mapping and delineation of streams network... I attached some comparison between several DEM sources in deriving river cross-section which is important for flood simulation.

the best

Azizian

Dear Asghar Azizian

Can you send articles related to your comparisons to my mailing ID

[email protected]

totally confused to choose DEM all have different comments..

some support ASTER, some on SRTM and Some on Cartosat and Some on ALOS DEM..

For flood Inundation (inland and coastal sea level rise),

landslide susceptibility mapping, watershed delineation and all morphometric topographic studies for Kerala, India region what should i rely. Any studies conducted in these region? please suggest for me..and please send to [email protected] mail ID..

Please search in Google, Hope you can find it.

http://www.digital-geography.com/dem-comparison-srtm-3-vs-aster-gdem-v2/

please see this link.

SRTM proved to be better for studying wetlands in our region

I recommend using SRTM.

One thing I want to add, you can do a bias correction with the SRTM DEM, if you have some observations of ground elevations in your region. If you do the bias correction (subtract the average deviation with observation data, from the SRTM file), the DEM is bias corrected and can be a very good fit, especially for hydrological modelling.

SRTM, Check the height accuracy in this link,

https://www.int-arch-photogramm-remote-sens-spatial-inf-sci.net/XL-4/243/2014/isprsarchives-XL-4-243-2014.pdf

Depends on the research question, scalar requirements, and availability. For southern Iraq, we have used both. We have generated 30m ASTER DEMs from no-cost, freely available imagery, especially useful for basin gradients and identifying pockets of wind scouring. We have used SRTM to very good effect for linear micro-topography -- identifying relict canal levees. However, SRTM has a lot of striping (requires image correction), and large areas of water coverage skew the interpretation histograms, so in flat terrain with little relief, you must block or mask those areas, mosaic around them, or do bias correction as Fahad says above. which gets tricky. Contact my colleague Carrie Hritz and see here 2006 article " Using Shuttle Radar Topography to map ancient water channels in Mesopotamia ". Also, I think my 2003 "Marshland of cities" shows some (older) comparisons of those DEMS in that region..

No he tenido la oportunidad de trabajar con las ASTER DEM, sin embargo recurro a las SRTM 90m frecuentemente. Por supuesto que se depende de la escala de trabajo, pero yo he obtenido resultados muy precisos, incluso en la generación de modelos de escurrimiento, que en campo, estos arroyos no poseen ni 10m de ancho y sin embargo el modelo los ha detectado con mucha precisión. Mi área de estudio es considerada como una llanura y las diferencias topográficas difícilmente superen los 5 o 10, no obstante los resultados fueron impecables. También lo aplicamos para detectar médanos y los resultados fueron positivos.

Si tu objetivo es tener idea del contexto general de tu área de estudio y tener una primera aproximación de cómo es el relieve, las SRTM son muy buenas, así que voto por ellas.

Te adjunto un paper con los resultados del escurrimiento. Si bien está en español, creo que podrás interpretar las figuras.

Saludos y muchos éxitos

Can some one provide a link on which i can download DEM files, especially for Uganda.? Thank you.

Hello everyone

The choice of the DEM for elevation mapping is related with the characteristics of the area you have to study.

If your study area is covered by vegetation, the SRTM-DEM is more accurate, because it is produced with a penetrating radar sensor (C-band)

If your study area is non vegetated, the ASTER-DEM is better, because of its original spatial resolution. In fact, ASTER produce a DSM which is affected by vegetation. No vegetation => DSM = DTM.

All the best

The Aster data is terrible in low-lying flat Bangladesh. Much of Sylhet shows up as below sea level. Features are mostly artifacts. SRTM is much better except for some striping artifacts. Comparing to GPS elevations, it is accurate in open fields but overestimates elevations in villages due to tree cover. This is particularly noticeable in Sundarbans.

Its all depend upon your study area. I also studied DEMs of different spatial resolution for elevation mapping. I found that for my study area, which is located at Doon Valley, SRTM 30m is better than ASTER-DEM.

SRTM offcourse

Depends on the research question, scalar requirements, and availability

ALOS PALSAR by 12.5 meter resolution is best free DEM.

https://vertex-retired.daac.asf.alaska.edu/

And you can produce good DEM from sentinel1.

I would also suggest ALOS PALSAR DEM. If you are not able to download it from Alaska SAR facility, there is an alternative for getting the data for your region:

https://youtu.be/eMVw8MLPpus

Depending on the purpose of the study, both types of data can be used.

ASTER and the SRTM data are well applicable for elevation mapping but their usage depends on the research question, vertical accuracy and their coverage. Also, the ASTER data processing requires filling the sinks and missing values on the image data.

You can use ALOS PALSAR DEM 12.5 meter resolution

If you use the DEMs suggested by Ismail Mondal , Jorge Arigony-Neto and Mehdi Moradi , you should be aware that the DEMs included with the ALOS PALSAR products available from ASF are the DEMs that were used to process the RTC products.

They are NOT generated from the PALSAR imagery, but are simply mosaicked and clipped from publicly-available DEMs, such as SRTM and NED. They have been resampled to match the pixel spacing of the RTC product (12.5-m for the high-res product), but that is NOT an indication of the original DEM resolution.

Refer to https://asf.alaska.edu/data-sets/derived-data-sets/alos-palsar-rtc/alos-palsar-radiometric-terrain-correction/#dem_information for more information about the DEMs used for processing PALSAR RTC.

The vertical accuracy of SRTM is higher compared to ASTER.

Its all depend upon your study area. I also studied DEMs of different spatial resolution for elevation mapping.

I find SRTM better than ASTER in my experience.

From using DEM sources I fond SRTM is better than ASTER because it has better vertical Accuracy.

I prefer SRTM to ASTER.

SRTM provides higher vertical accuracy

ASTER is my choice.

SRTM looks preferable to ASTER.

SRTM is better than ASTER, but I would suggest checking new available DEM's - Copernicus Digital Elevation Model for instance.

SRTM DEM vertical accuracy is higher than ASTER DEM. The degree of superiority is depend mainly on the type of the study area (urban, rural or forest area). @Syed Ahmad Ali Please, refer for DEM accuracy comparison in urban area from: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs12518-021-00398-9

SRTM DEM provides more accuracy in values for vertical assessment.