Lake · Finland · Sweden
Kilpisjärvi
Lake in Enontekiö, Finland, and Kiruna, Sweden
- Area
- 22.9km²
- Max depth
- 48m
- Average depth
- 23m
- Elevation
- 457m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 36km
- Volume
- 0.531km³
Kilpisjärvi is a lake in Finland. It covers 22.9 km². On average it is 23 m deep, and 48 m at its deepest point. Its surface lies 457 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Kilpisjärvi?
The water is warmest in August, around 13 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 0 °C. Even at its warmest, the surface stays below 17 °C on average: this is cold water.
The lake usually freezes over for about 207 days a year, from around 1 November to 26 May.
On the shore, afternoons reach 14 °C on average in July and -10 °C in January. The driest month is April (56 mm of rain), the wettest July (133 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (113 readings). Shallow bays and beaches are often warmer.
From above
The whole lake from space
Month by month
The year at the lake, month by month
Not a forecast: these are averages over many years. Water is the 2013–2021 average; air, rain, sun and wind are the 1991–2020 average.
Water: 2013–2021 averageClimate: 1991–2020 average
| Month | Water°C | Water high°C | Air high°C | Air low°C | Rainmm | Rainy daysdays | Sunh/day | Windkm/h |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | Ice | — | -10 | -15 | 59 | 18 | 0.5 | 15 |
| February | Ice | — | -9 | -15 | 59 | 16 | 1.0 | 15 |
| March | Ice | — | -6 | -13 | 62 | 19 | 4.1 | 15 |
| April | Ice | — | -1 | -8 | 56 | 18 | 7.5 | 13 |
| May | Ice | — | 3 | -2 | 75 | 19 | 8.2 | 12 |
| June | 4 | 8 | 10 | 4 | 109 | 21 | 7.3 | 11 |
| July | 11 | 13 | 14 | 8 | 133 | 23 | 6.7 | 10 |
| August | 13 | 13 | 12 | 6 | 112 | 22 | 5.3 | 9 |
| September | 9 | 11 | 6 | 2 | 88 | 20 | 3.3 | 10 |
| October | 4 | 7 | -1 | -5 | 72 | 20 | 1.2 | 11 |
| November | Ice | — | -6 | -10 | 61 | 18 | 0.5 | 13 |
| December | Ice | — | -8 | -13 | 68 | 19 | — | 15 |
Water: LakeTEMP (Landsat 8, 2013–2021). Air, rain, sun and wind: NASA POWER, 1991–2020 averages. A rainy day has at least 1 mm of rain. Sunshine hours are derived from measured solar radiation.
Size & depth
How big, how deep
- On average, water stays in the lake for about 3.4 years before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 332 km² of land.
- About 5.0 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
Around the shore
What's around Kilpisjärvi
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 1beaches and swimming spots
- 3campsites
Kilpisjärven Retkeilykeskus, Kilpisjärven Lomakeskus Tundrea
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- 3marinas and slipways
- 2ferry piers
Kilpisjärvi - Koltalukta
- 2viewpoints
Saana 747 näköalatasanne 2
- 11hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Arctic Polar Holiday Village, Kilpisjärven retkeilykeskus, Hotelli Kilpis, Haltinmaa, Kilpis-Arkki and 6 more
- —fishing spots
- 4restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Sørkjosen Airport (SOJ), 84 km in a straight line.
Car hire at TOS airport (Tromsø)Discover Cars · Affiliate linkOpenStreetMap is built by volunteers: when a number is low, it may just mean nobody has mapped it yet.
Recent years
How each month compared
Afternoon high on the shore. The first row is the reference, the 1991–2020 average in °C; the years below show the difference from it: warmer in orange, cooler in blue.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1991–2020 average | -10.0 | -9.3 | -5.7 | -1.2 | 2.9 | 9.8 | 14.3 | 12.1 | 6.5 | -0.9 | -5.7 | -7.9 |
| 2020 | +3.0 | +2.6 | +0.9 | −1.3 | −2.5 | +1.2 | −1.5 | −0.1 | −0.1 | +1.1 | +3.2 | −0.2 |
| 2021 | −1.7 | ±0.0 | +1.3 | −0.5 | −2.2 | +2.1 | +0.6 | −1.0 | −1.4 | +0.1 | −0.7 | −2.7 |
| 2022 | +2.4 | −0.5 | +3.2 | −0.6 | −0.6 | +2.0 | +0.2 | +1.4 | −0.4 | +1.8 | +1.3 | −1.5 |
| 2023 | +2.6 | +4.6 | −1.9 | +1.0 | +0.2 | +2.9 | +0.8 | +2.6 | +1.4 | −2.2 | −2.9 | −3.7 |
| 2024 | +0.4 | ±0.0 | +1.8 | −1.4 | +1.9 | +3.9 | +2.5 | +3.3 | +2.2 | +0.9 | +2.8 | +0.4 |
| 2025 | +1.8 | +4.4 | +2.1 | −0.4 | −0.8 | −0.7 | +2.8 | +0.3 | +3.8 | +1.6 | −0.3 | +1.5 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
NorwayAbout these numbers
| Outline, area, depth, volume | HydroLAKES v1.0 (Messager et al. 2016) · CC BY 4.0 |
|---|---|
| Water temperature and ice | LakeTEMP v1 (Korver et al. 2024), Landsat 8 2013–2021 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Air, rain, sun, wind | NASA POWER, 1991–2020 · public domain |
| Names and description | Wikidata (Q205829) · CC0 |
| Around the shore | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
Every figure is an average or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.
