Lake · Switzerland
Lake Murten
Lake in Switzerland
- Area
- 21.6km²
- Max depth
- 45m
- Average depth
- 9.7m
- Elevation
- 423m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 21km
- Volume
- 0.210km³
Lake Murten is a lake in Switzerland. It covers 21.6 km². On average it is 9.7 m deep, and 45 m at its deepest point. Its surface lies 423 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Lake Murten?
The water is warmest in July, around 24 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 3 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from June to September: comfortable for most swimmers.
It does not normally freeze in winter.
On the shore, afternoons reach 22 °C on average in July and 2 °C in January. The driest month is February (66 mm of rain), the wettest May (124 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (125 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 | 3 | 3 | 2 | -4 | 85 | 12 | 2.2 | 14 |
| February | 4 | 5 | 3 | -4 | 66 | 12 | 3.5 | 14 |
| March | 7 | 9 | 7 | -1 | 86 | 13 | 5.1 | 14 |
| April | 11 | 14 | 12 | 3 | 83 | 13 | 6.5 | 12 |
| May | 16 | 19 | 16 | 7 | 124 | 17 | 6.8 | 12 |
| June | 21 | 23 | 20 | 12 | 112 | 16 | 8.4 | 12 |
| July | 24 | 24 | 22 | 13 | 113 | 16 | 8.5 | 11 |
| August | 23 | 24 | 22 | 13 | 118 | 14 | 7.6 | 11 |
| September | 20 | 22 | 18 | 9 | 83 | 13 | 6.4 | 11 |
| October | 15 | 18 | 13 | 5 | 100 | 13 | 4.3 | 12 |
| November | 9 | 12 | 7 | 0 | 85 | 13 | 2.4 | 12 |
| December | 4 | 6 | 2 | -3 | 96 | 14 | 1.7 | 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 5 months before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 698 km² of land.
- About 15 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
Around the shore
What's around Lake Murten
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 15beaches and swimming spots
Salavaux Plage and 14 more
- 6campsites
TCS Camping Salavaux Plage, Camping Les Joncs, Praz Novy, Camping Muntelier, Camping Port Plage Avenches and 1 more
- 3boat hire and water-sport clubs
wakeboard.ch, Topas, mOcean 'Pebu'
- 23marinas and slipways
Vieux Port de Faoug, Slip Segelclub Murten, Sportboothafen, Port d'Avenches, Vallamand and 18 more
- 7ferry piers
Motier, Faoug, Murten/Morat (Schiff/bateau), Vallamand, Praz (Vully) and 2 more
- 14viewpoints
- 20hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Schiff, Le Vieux Manoir, Hotel Murten, Hôtel de la gare, Perron 13 and 15 more
- —fishing spots
- 69restaurants and cafés
Towns on the shore
- Murten/Morat5,800 people
- Avenches2,758 people
- Bas-Vully1,963 people
- Courgevaux1,057 people
- Münchenwiler
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Bern Airport (BRN), 32 km in a straight line.
Car hire at BRN airport (Bern)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 | 1.6 | 2.7 | 7.4 | 12.3 | 16.0 | 20.2 | 22.1 | 21.8 | 17.8 | 13.2 | 6.8 | 2.5 |
| 2020 | +2.1 | +3.8 | +0.4 | +3.4 | +0.9 | −1.5 | +0.8 | +1.6 | +2.1 | −2.0 | +2.0 | +0.4 |
| 2021 | −1.0 | +3.7 | +0.2 | −2.1 | −2.9 | +1.5 | −1.4 | −2.0 | +1.6 | −0.3 | −1.4 | +0.1 |
| 2022 | +0.7 | +2.3 | +2.9 | −0.4 | +2.8 | +3.2 | +4.0 | +3.9 | ±0.0 | +4.2 | +2.0 | +1.2 |
| 2023 | +1.2 | +2.4 | +1.3 | −1.9 | +0.4 | +2.8 | +2.3 | +2.6 | +5.9 | +4.2 | ±0.0 | +2.0 |
| 2024 | +1.6 | +4.8 | +2.7 | −0.2 | −0.1 | −0.1 | +1.3 | +2.3 | −1.1 | +1.6 | +1.3 | ±0.0 |
| 2025 | +1.9 | +2.0 | +2.1 | +1.8 | +0.6 | +3.4 | −0.2 | +2.3 | −0.6 | −1.2 | +0.2 | +2.2 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
Nearby
More lakes nearby
Switzerland210 km² · 12 km away23°maxLake BielSwitzerland37.6 km² · 18 km away22°maxLake GenevaSwitzerland572 km² · 64 km away22°maxLac de SchiffenenSwitzerland3.0 km² · 10 km away24°maxLac de la GruyèreSwitzerland6.3 km² · 28 km away22°maxLake ThunSwitzerland45.8 km² · 56 km away21°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 (Q14448) · 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.
