Lake · China
West Lake
Lake in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China
- Area
- 5.1km²
- Average depth
- 5.6m
- Elevation
- 10m a.s.l.
- Shoreline
- 14km
- Volume
- 0.029km³
West Lake is a lake in China. It covers 5.1 km². On average it is 5.6 m deep. Its surface lies 10 m above sea level.
Plan your visit
Stay, sail and get there
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The water
How warm is West Lake?
The water is warmest in July, around 31 °C at the surface, and coldest in January, around 7 °C. The surface averages 20 °C or more from May to October: comfortable for most swimmers.
It does not normally freeze in winter.
On the shore, afternoons reach 32 °C on average in July and 8 °C in January. The driest month is December (59 mm of rain), the wettest June (230 mm).
Average surface temperature measured by the Landsat 8 satellite between 2013 and 2021 at the point furthest from the shore (52 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 | 7 | 8 | 8 | -1 | 78 | 10 | 2.3 | 12 |
| February | 9 | 11 | 11 | 1 | 90 | 10 | 2.3 | 12 |
| March | 14 | 17 | 16 | 5 | 105 | 13 | 3.5 | 13 |
| April | 20 | 22 | 22 | 10 | 115 | 12 | 4.1 | 13 |
| May | 25 | 28 | 27 | 16 | 124 | 12 | 4.2 | 12 |
| June | 30 | 31 | 29 | 20 | 230 | 17 | 2.8 | 11 |
| July | 31 | 32 | 32 | 24 | 168 | 16 | 5.6 | 11 |
| August | 31 | 31 | 32 | 24 | 177 | 17 | 5.5 | 12 |
| September | 28 | 30 | 28 | 19 | 129 | 12 | 3.9 | 12 |
| October | 23 | 26 | 24 | 13 | 74 | 7 | 4.0 | 11 |
| November | 16 | 20 | 18 | 7 | 77 | 9 | 3.0 | 11 |
| December | 10 | 12 | 10 | 0 | 59 | 8 | 3.1 | 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 17 months before flowing out.
- Its catchment drains 28 km² of land.
- About 0.6 m³ of water flow out every second, on average.
Around the shore
What's around West Lake
Counted within 1.5 km of the shoreline in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit.
- —beaches and swimming spots
- 1campsites
- 1boat hire and water-sport clubs
- 2marinas and slipways
- 24ferry piers
- 21viewpoints
Leifeng Pagoda in Evening Glow, Light show (Dancing fountains), Evening Bell Ringing on Nanping Hill, Orioles Singing in the Willows, Diamond hill under the evening sunlight and 16 more
- 109hotels, B&Bs and chalets
Landison Plaza, Grand Hyatt Hangzhou, Hangzhou International Hotel, Lily Hotel, Pod Inn and 104 more
- —fishing spots
- 239restaurants and cafés
Nearest airport with scheduled flights: Hangzhou Xiaoshan International Airport (HGH), 27 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 | 8.1 | 10.9 | 15.9 | 21.9 | 26.8 | 29.4 | 32.4 | 32.1 | 28.4 | 23.6 | 17.6 | 10.4 |
| 2020 | +1.6 | +2.6 | +0.8 | −1.0 | +1.5 | ±0.0 | −2.9 | +0.4 | −1.4 | −1.7 | +0.6 | −0.4 |
| 2021 | +1.8 | +4.5 | +1.1 | −0.1 | +0.7 | +0.4 | −1.5 | −1.4 | +0.9 | +0.1 | +0.1 | +1.8 |
| 2022 | +0.9 | −2.7 | +3.0 | +0.6 | −1.1 | +1.0 | +1.9 | +4.3 | +0.4 | −0.2 | +3.1 | −1.8 |
| 2023 | +2.4 | +0.6 | +1.9 | +0.8 | +0.8 | +1.3 | −0.2 | −0.2 | +1.4 | +1.8 | +2.0 | +0.7 |
| 2024 | +2.7 | −0.8 | +2.0 | +0.5 | −0.8 | −0.7 | +1.0 | +3.5 | +3.0 | −0.7 | +0.3 | −0.2 |
| 2025 | +2.9 | −0.5 | +1.7 | +3.8 | +1.3 | +0.6 | −0.4 | +2.2 | +3.3 | +3.1 | +1.0 | +3.9 |
+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 (Q502371) · 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.
