Lake · El Salvador · Guatemala
Lake Güija
Lake in Guatemala and El Salvador
- Area
- 36.3km²
- Max depth
- 20m
- Average depth
- 11m
- Elevation
- 422m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 59km
- Volume
- 0.400km³
Lake Güija is a lake in El Salvador. It covers 36.3 km². On average it is 11 m deep, and 20 m at its deepest point. Its surface lies 422 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Lake Güija?
The water is warmest in September, around 29 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 24 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from January to December: comfortable for most swimmers.
It does not normally freeze in winter.
On the shore, afternoons reach 32 °C on average in April and 24 °C in November. The driest month is March (20 mm of rain), the wettest September (224 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (129 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 | 24 | 24 | 25 | 15 | 26 | 7 | 8.0 | 16 |
| February | 24 | 25 | 28 | 15 | 21 | 5 | 8.6 | 14 |
| March | 26 | 27 | 30 | 16 | 20 | 4 | 8.8 | 14 |
| April | 28 | 28 | 32 | 18 | 37 | 7 | 8.2 | 11 |
| May | 28 | 29 | 30 | 20 | 142 | 18 | 6.9 | 8 |
| June | 29 | 29 | 27 | 19 | 198 | 24 | 7.0 | 8 |
| July | 28 | 28 | 27 | 19 | 165 | 22 | 8.1 | 9 |
| August | 28 | 29 | 27 | 19 | 198 | 23 | 8.0 | 8 |
| September | 29 | 29 | 26 | 19 | 224 | 24 | 6.9 | 7 |
| October | 28 | 29 | 25 | 18 | 158 | 20 | 6.6 | 9 |
| November | 27 | 28 | 24 | 16 | 62 | 12 | 7.4 | 14 |
| December | 25 | 26 | 24 | 15 | 33 | 9 | 7.9 | 14 |
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 months before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 2,542 km² of land.
- About 45 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
- Its shoreline is 2.8 times longer than a circle of the same area: plenty of bays and inlets.
Around the shore
What's around Lake Güija
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 4beaches and swimming spots
Playa El Tablón, Playa El Tamarindo, Playa de Azacualpa, Playa El Amatal
- —campsites
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- —marinas and slipways
- —ferry piers
- —viewpoints
- 1hotels, B&Bs and chalets
La Perla de Azacualpa
- —fishing spots
- 1restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Ilopango International Airport (ILS), 77 km in a straight line.
Car hire at SAL airport (San Salvador)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 | 25.0 | 27.7 | 29.9 | 31.7 | 29.7 | 26.9 | 26.7 | 26.7 | 26.0 | 25.2 | 24.1 | 24.4 |
| 2020 | +1.1 | +1.0 | +1.3 | +2.2 | −0.2 | −0.2 | +0.1 | −0.6 | +0.3 | +0.3 | +0.1 | −0.8 |
| 2021 | −0.8 | −2.1 | −2.6 | −3.6 | −1.0 | −0.8 | −0.4 | −0.5 | ±0.0 | +0.9 | −0.8 | −0.2 |
| 2022 | −1.1 | −3.0 | −3.5 | −2.2 | −2.5 | −1.4 | −0.4 | −0.6 | −0.3 | ±0.0 | +0.9 | −0.7 |
| 2023 | −0.8 | −2.3 | −0.8 | ±0.0 | +1.9 | +3.0 | +1.1 | +1.0 | +1.5 | +0.6 | +1.2 | +0.4 |
| 2024 | +1.7 | +1.2 | +1.9 | −0.2 | +3.5 | +1.0 | +0.1 | +0.5 | +1.3 | +0.6 | +1.5 | −0.1 |
| 2025 | +0.8 | +0.9 | +1.6 | −0.1 | +2.8 | +0.3 | +0.6 | +1.6 | +1.7 | +1.0 | +2.1 | +2.5 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
Nearby
More lakes nearby
El Salvador23.5 km² · 45 km away27°maxLake IlopangoEl Salvador69.3 km² · 84 km away29°maxLake AmatitlánGuatemala15.2 km² · 111 km away25°maxLake IzabalGuatemala670 km² · 141 km away30°maxLago de AtitlánGuatemala123 km² · 186 km away24°maxLake Yojoa
Honduras79.0 km² · 180 km away28°maxAbout 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 (Q1800414) · 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.
