Reservoir · Chile
Lake Rapel
Lake
- Area
- 53.3km²
- Average depth
- 13m
- Elevation
- 108m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 153km
- Volume
- 0.680km³
Lake Rapel is a reservoir in Chile. It covers 53.3 km². On average it is 13 m deep. Its surface lies 108 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Lake Rapel?
The water is warmest in January, around 26 °C at the surface, and coldest in July, around 10 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from November to March: comfortable for most swimmers.
It does not normally freeze in winter.
On the shore, afternoons reach 31 °C on average in January and 14 °C in July. The driest month is January (2 mm of rain), the wettest June (79 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 | 26 | 31 | 12 | 2 | 0 | 11.5 | 11 |
| February | 25 | 26 | 30 | 12 | 3 | 0 | 10.5 | 10 |
| March | 23 | 24 | 28 | 11 | 7 | 1 | 9.4 | 10 |
| April | 19 | 21 | 23 | 9 | 13 | 3 | 7.6 | 8 |
| May | 14 | 16 | 18 | 7 | 61 | 6 | 5.4 | 8 |
| June | 11 | 12 | 15 | 6 | 79 | 9 | 4.9 | 8 |
| July | 10 | 11 | 14 | 5 | 65 | 7 | 5.5 | 8 |
| August | 12 | 14 | 15 | 5 | 60 | 6 | 6.2 | 8 |
| September | 16 | 18 | 18 | 6 | 20 | 4 | 7.7 | 8 |
| October | 20 | 22 | 21 | 7 | 14 | 2 | 9.1 | 10 |
| November | 23 | 24 | 26 | 9 | 7 | 1 | 10.9 | 11 |
| December | 25 | 25 | 29 | 11 | 5 | 1 | 11.6 | 12 |
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 47 days before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 13,293 km² of land.
- About 166 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
- Its shoreline is 5.9 times longer than a circle of the same area: plenty of bays and inlets.
Around the shore
What's around Lake Rapel
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 4beaches and swimming spots
- 15campsites
Camping Los Pinos, Camping Tropical Lake, Club de Campo y Marina Las Palmas de Rapel, Camping de Carabineros, Camping La Patita and 10 more
- —boat hire and water-sport clubs
- 8marinas and slipways
Bahía Atenas, Lago Rapel, Club de Yates Santiago, Club Náutico Rapel, Puerto Coipo and 3 more
- 3ferry piers
Terminal Turístico
- 12viewpoints
Embalse Rapel, Mirador Las Cadenas, Río Tinguiririca, Plaza la Gruta de Lourdes, Represa Rapel and 7 more
- 9hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Marina Terramar, Cabañas La Puntilla, Hotel Marina Punta Verde, Marina Golf Rapel, Resort Jardín del Lago and 4 more
- 2fishing spots
Zona de Pesca La Gruta
- 8restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Comodoro Arturo Merino Benítez International Airport (SCL), 101 km in a straight line.
Car hire at SCL airport (Santiago)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 | 30.7 | 29.8 | 27.7 | 23.0 | 18.5 | 15.0 | 14.2 | 15.3 | 17.8 | 21.3 | 26.0 | 28.9 |
| 2020 | +0.2 | +0.7 | +0.7 | +1.2 | +3.4 | −1.5 | −0.4 | −1.3 | +0.2 | +0.8 | +0.2 | +0.4 |
| 2021 | −1.5 | −2.2 | −1.3 | −0.5 | +1.1 | +2.3 | +2.1 | +1.1 | +1.5 | +2.8 | +1.0 | +0.4 |
| 2022 | −1.7 | −0.4 | −0.1 | −0.7 | +0.1 | +0.4 | −0.8 | +0.8 | +0.3 | +2.2 | +2.2 | +2.3 |
| 2023 | −0.5 | +2.0 | +1.9 | +1.0 | +1.5 | +2.1 | +2.2 | +1.9 | −1.0 | −1.0 | −2.1 | −0.3 |
| 2024 | +1.0 | +1.7 | +0.9 | −0.8 | −3.0 | −0.3 | −0.2 | −0.8 | +0.7 | +2.7 | +0.9 | +0.3 |
| 2025 | +1.1 | +1.6 | −0.1 | −0.5 | +0.4 | −0.6 | +1.9 | +1.0 | +0.9 | +2.1 | +0.7 | +1.1 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
ArgentinaAbout 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 (Q958770) · 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.
