Salt lake · Kazakhstan
Lake Alakol
Lake in Kazakhstan
- Area
- 2,919km²
- Max depth
- 54m
- Average depth
- 22m
- Elevation
- 347m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 567km
- Volume
- 64.5km³
Lake Alakol is a salt lake in Kazakhstan. It covers 2,919 km². On average it is 22 m deep, and 54 m at its deepest point. Its surface lies 347 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Lake Alakol?
The water is warmest in July, around 23 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 0 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from July to August: comfortable for most swimmers.
The lake usually freezes over for about 113 days a year, from around 17 December to 8 April.
On the shore, afternoons reach 31 °C on average in July and -2 °C in January. The driest month is September (17 mm of rain), the wettest June (31 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (83 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 | — | -2 | -11 | 20 | 6 | 5.3 | 15 |
| February | Ice | — | 1 | -7 | 18 | 5 | 6.6 | 16 |
| March | Ice | — | 10 | 1 | 18 | 5 | 7.1 | 18 |
| April | 2 | 6 | 18 | 9 | 27 | 7 | 8.9 | 16 |
| May | 11 | 15 | 24 | 14 | 27 | 6 | 11.2 | 15 |
| June | 18 | 21 | 29 | 20 | 31 | 7 | 11.2 | 13 |
| July | 23 | 23 | 31 | 23 | 27 | 7 | 10.9 | 12 |
| August | 22 | 23 | 30 | 21 | 18 | 5 | 10.9 | 13 |
| September | 18 | 21 | 23 | 15 | 17 | 4 | 9.5 | 14 |
| October | 13 | 16 | 15 | 7 | 23 | 5 | 6.7 | 15 |
| November | 7 | 10 | 6 | -1 | 26 | 7 | 4.2 | 15 |
| December | 1 | 3 | -1 | -9 | 21 | 6 | 3.8 | 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 37 years before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 63,248 km² of land.
- About 56 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
- Its shoreline is 3.0 times longer than a circle of the same area: plenty of bays and inlets.
Around the shore
What's around Lake Alakol
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 3beaches and swimming spots
- 12campsites
AQUAMARINE Resort, Alateniz, Zhalyn and 9 more
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- —marinas and slipways
- —ferry piers
- —viewpoints
- 46hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Alakol Arasan, AkSai, Alazis and 43 more
- 1fishing spots
- 9restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Bole Alashankou Airport (BPL), 127 km in a straight line.
Car hire at ALA airport (Almaty)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 | -2.1 | 1.4 | 9.7 | 17.5 | 23.6 | 28.9 | 30.8 | 29.6 | 23.4 | 15.2 | 6.2 | -0.9 |
| 2020 | +1.9 | +3.8 | −0.1 | +3.6 | +1.9 | −0.8 | −0.4 | +0.2 | −2.0 | −1.6 | −1.7 | −2.6 |
| 2021 | −0.8 | +3.2 | −1.7 | −0.7 | +1.6 | −0.9 | +2.4 | +0.2 | +1.9 | −2.3 | −1.1 | +3.7 |
| 2022 | +5.1 | +1.9 | −0.7 | +3.1 | +2.7 | +2.5 | +1.0 | −0.6 | +2.8 | +0.6 | −0.8 | −2.6 |
| 2023 | −1.3 | +2.9 | +2.3 | −1.4 | −2.2 | +1.7 | +2.6 | +0.5 | −1.3 | +2.7 | +3.6 | +2.2 |
| 2024 | +3.5 | −1.3 | −0.8 | +0.6 | +2.0 | +1.8 | +0.7 | +2.5 | −2.2 | +0.6 | +1.3 | +0.5 |
| 2025 | +3.0 | +1.3 | −0.9 | +2.3 | +2.7 | +2.9 | +2.3 | −0.3 | −0.4 | −1.5 | +1.7 | +3.3 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
ChinaAbout 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 (Q310547) · 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.
