Lake · Turkmenistan · Uzbekistan
Sarygamysh Lake
Salt lake
- Area
- 3,772km²
- Max depth
- 40m
- Average depth
- 12m
- Elevation
- 2m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 497km
- Volume
- 46.0km³
Sarygamysh Lake is a lake in Turkmenistan. It covers 3,772 km². On average it is 12 m deep, and 40 m at its deepest point. Its surface lies 2 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is Sarygamysh Lake?
The water is warmest in July, around 26 °C at the surface, and coldest in February, around 0 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from June to September: comfortable for most swimmers.
The lake usually freezes over for about 34 days a year, from around 20 January to 22 February.
On the shore, afternoons reach 38 °C on average in July and 1 °C in January. The driest month is August (1 mm of rain), the wettest March (15 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (100 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 | 0 | 2 | 1 | -7 | 6 | 2 | 3.5 | 16 |
| February | Ice | — | 4 | -6 | 8 | 2 | 5.3 | 18 |
| March | 3 | 5 | 14 | 1 | 15 | 3 | 7.5 | 18 |
| April | 9 | 12 | 22 | 8 | 13 | 3 | 8.8 | 18 |
| May | 17 | 20 | 31 | 17 | 9 | 2 | 10.8 | 18 |
| June | 24 | 26 | 36 | 23 | 2 | 1 | 12.2 | 18 |
| July | 26 | 26 | 38 | 25 | 2 | 0 | 11.7 | 17 |
| August | 25 | 26 | 36 | 23 | 1 | 0 | 11.4 | 17 |
| September | 21 | 23 | 29 | 16 | 2 | 0 | 10.0 | 17 |
| October | 16 | 19 | 19 | 7 | 5 | 1 | 7.7 | 16 |
| November | 10 | 13 | 9 | -1 | 7 | 2 | 5.0 | 16 |
| December | 4 | 7 | 2 | -6 | 8 | 2 | 3.5 | 16 |
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
- Its catchment drains 72,245 km² of land.
Around the shore
What's around Sarygamysh Lake
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
- 1ferry piers
- —viewpoints
- —hotels, B&Bs and chalets
- —fishing spots
- —restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Nukus International Airport (NCU), 191 km in a straight line.
OpenStreetMap 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 | 1.1 | 4.2 | 13.7 | 21.8 | 30.7 | 36.5 | 38.5 | 36.3 | 28.9 | 19.1 | 8.9 | 1.8 |
| 2020 | +1.2 | +3.1 | +1.3 | −1.4 | +0.6 | +0.8 | +0.6 | −2.2 | −2.0 | −0.9 | −2.6 | −5.0 |
| 2021 | −0.1 | +1.8 | −4.6 | +3.0 | +3.0 | +2.4 | +1.4 | +1.7 | −0.3 | −3.8 | −1.9 | +1.1 |
| 2022 | −0.2 | +3.3 | −3.1 | +3.5 | −2.3 | +1.2 | +0.4 | −0.5 | +1.3 | ±0.0 | −0.2 | −3.0 |
| 2023 | −1.4 | +1.6 | +5.4 | +1.8 | −1.2 | ±0.0 | +0.9 | +0.2 | −1.7 | ±0.0 | +6.0 | +1.4 |
| 2024 | +0.3 | +0.8 | −1.8 | +2.8 | −3.5 | +0.7 | −1.2 | +0.1 | −1.6 | −1.1 | +0.3 | −0.4 |
| 2025 | +0.2 | −2.9 | −1.2 | +4.5 | +2.2 | −1.2 | +0.9 | +0.3 | −1.1 | +1.6 | +3.6 | +1.2 |
+1 warmer than usual −1 cooler than usual
About 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 (Q257416) · 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.
