Lagoon · Benin
Lake Nokoué
Lake in Benin
- Area
- 175km²
- Average depth
- 1.2m
- Elevation
- 0m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 123km
- Volume
- 0.218km³
Lake Nokoué is a lagoon in Benin. It covers 175 km². On average it is 1.2 m deep. Its surface lies 0 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
The water
How warm is Lake Nokoué?
The water is warmest in November, around 28 °C at the surface, and coldest in July, around 25 °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 30 °C on average in February and 27 °C in August. The driest month is December (20 mm of rain), the wettest June (216 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (89 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 | 26 | 27 | 30 | 23 | 20 | 5 | 6.2 | 9 |
| February | 26 | 26 | 30 | 25 | 32 | 9 | 5.6 | 11 |
| March | 26 | 26 | 30 | 26 | 78 | 19 | 5.7 | 12 |
| April | 26 | 27 | 29 | 26 | 119 | 24 | 5.8 | 12 |
| May | 26 | 26 | 29 | 25 | 174 | 28 | 5.3 | 11 |
| June | 26 | 26 | 28 | 24 | 216 | 28 | 3.8 | 12 |
| July | 25 | 25 | 27 | 23 | 165 | 24 | 3.9 | 14 |
| August | 25 | 26 | 27 | 23 | 93 | 20 | 4.0 | 15 |
| September | 26 | 27 | 27 | 23 | 198 | 27 | 4.1 | 12 |
| October | 28 | 28 | 28 | 24 | 172 | 27 | 5.2 | 10 |
| November | 28 | 28 | 29 | 25 | 55 | 13 | 6.6 | 9 |
| December | 28 | 28 | 30 | 24 | 20 | 5 | 6.7 | 8 |
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 9 days before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 59,896 km² of land.
- About 284 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
- Its shoreline is 2.6 times longer than a circle of the same area: plenty of bays and inlets.
Around the shore
What's around Lake Nokoué
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- —beaches and swimming spots
- —campsites
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- —marinas and slipways
- 2ferry piers
Embarcadère pour Ganvié
- —viewpoints
- 38hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Hôtel Peace and Love, Hôtel chez Clarisse, Résidence Jeanne d'Arc, Pantagruel, Auberge l'Abri and 33 more
- —fishing spots
- 81restaurants and cafés
Towns on the shore
- Cotonou679,012 people
- Abomey-Calavi385,755 people
- Godomè253,262 people
- Ekpé75,313 people
- Ganvié20,000 people
- So-Ava
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Cotonou Cadjehoun International Airport (COO), 12 km in a straight line.
Car hire at LOS airport (Lagos)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 | 29.8 | 30.2 | 29.9 | 29.4 | 28.8 | 27.7 | 26.9 | 26.8 | 27.3 | 28.0 | 29.0 | 29.7 |
| 2020 | −0.1 | +0.5 | ±0.0 | +0.3 | +0.4 | +0.3 | −0.2 | ±0.0 | ±0.0 | +0.1 | +0.2 | −0.2 |
| 2021 | −0.1 | ±0.0 | −0.5 | +0.2 | +0.3 | +0.7 | +0.6 | +0.6 | +0.4 | +0.3 | −0.2 | +0.1 |
| 2022 | −0.3 | +0.2 | ±0.0 | −0.4 | +0.2 | ±0.0 | +0.2 | −0.1 | −0.1 | +0.3 | ±0.0 | −0.9 |
| 2023 | −0.4 | ±0.0 | −0.1 | ±0.0 | +0.6 | +0.3 | +0.9 | +0.7 | +0.6 | +0.5 | ±0.0 | +0.6 |
| 2024 | +0.8 | +0.2 | +0.5 | +0.9 | +1.0 | +0.9 | +0.5 | +0.5 | +0.6 | +0.2 | +0.6 | +0.2 |
| 2025 | −0.1 | −0.1 | +0.2 | +0.3 | +0.5 | +0.7 | +0.2 | ±0.0 | +0.4 | +0.3 | +0.6 | −0.4 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
Nigeria
Togo
GhanaAbout 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 (Q268631) · 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.
