Lake · Estonia
Pühajärv
Lake in Valga County, Estonia
- Area
- 2.6km²
- Average depth
- 6.4m
- Elevation
- 116m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 15km
- Volume
- 0.016km³
Pühajärv is a lake in Estonia. It covers 2.6 km². On average it is 6.4 m deep. Its surface lies 116 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 Pühajärv?
The water is warmest in July, around 22 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 0 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from June to July: comfortable for most swimmers.
The lake usually freezes over for about 127 days a year, from around 18 November to 24 March.
On the shore, afternoons reach 23 °C on average in July and -4 °C in January. The driest month is March (43 mm of rain), the wettest August (89 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (84 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 | — | -4 | -10 | 52 | 14 | 0.4 | 20 |
| February | Ice | — | -4 | -10 | 45 | 12 | 1.9 | 18 |
| March | Ice | — | 1 | -6 | 43 | 12 | 4.8 | 18 |
| April | 7 | 11 | 9 | 0 | 47 | 11 | 6.7 | 16 |
| May | 15 | 18 | 16 | 6 | 57 | 12 | 8.7 | 15 |
| June | 20 | 21 | 20 | 10 | 88 | 14 | 8.3 | 15 |
| July | 22 | 22 | 23 | 14 | 74 | 15 | 8.1 | 14 |
| August | 20 | 21 | 21 | 12 | 89 | 14 | 6.6 | 14 |
| September | 16 | 18 | 16 | 8 | 57 | 12 | 4.5 | 16 |
| October | 9 | 13 | 8 | 2 | 71 | 14 | 1.8 | 17 |
| November | 1 | 5 | 2 | -2 | 70 | 14 | 0.0 | 18 |
| December | Ice | — | -2 | -6 | 58 | 14 | 0.1 | 20 |
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 20 months before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 38 km² of land.
- About 0.3 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 Pühajärv
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- 7beaches and swimming spots
Pühajärve, Poslovitsa and 5 more
- 4campsites
Annimatsi, Kooliranna lõkkekoht, Kiigemäe lõkkekoht
- 1boat hire and water-sport clubs
Veesõidukite laenutus
- —marinas and slipways
- —ferry piers
- —viewpoints
- 6hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Valge Kroon, Hundu, Wooden house with sauna and fireplace near forest, lake and SP, Saaremäe, GMP Clubhotel and 1 more
- —fishing spots
- 2restaurants and cafés
Towns on the shore
- Otepää2,167 people
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Tartu Airport (TAY), 33 km in a straight line.
Car hire at TAY airport (Tartu)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 | -4.4 | -3.8 | 1.1 | 9.1 | 16.2 | 19.7 | 22.7 | 21.4 | 16.3 | 8.3 | 2.4 | -1.9 |
| 2020 | +7.2 | +6.3 | +3.2 | −0.7 | −2.6 | +3.0 | −2.0 | +0.1 | +1.2 | +2.9 | +2.7 | +0.6 |
| 2021 | −1.2 | −2.5 | +1.3 | −1.0 | −1.8 | +3.8 | +3.7 | −1.6 | −2.0 | +1.8 | +1.0 | −3.3 |
| 2022 | +2.7 | +3.4 | +0.9 | −1.0 | −2.2 | +2.0 | −0.2 | +3.3 | −2.5 | +1.9 | −0.2 | −2.8 |
| 2023 | +1.9 | +2.1 | +0.8 | +1.5 | +0.1 | +1.9 | −1.1 | +1.9 | +3.4 | −0.5 | −1.3 | −2.1 |
| 2024 | −2.4 | +2.2 | +3.4 | +0.8 | +2.6 | +1.9 | +0.5 | +0.8 | +4.2 | +2.3 | +1.9 | +2.9 |
| 2025 | +4.9 | +0.9 | +4.1 | +1.6 | −2.2 | −1.4 | +0.7 | −1.7 | +1.6 | +0.4 | +0.6 | +3.0 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
RussiaAbout 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 (Q1515717) · 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.
