What is the largest freshwater lake in the world?
Quick answer
By surface area, the largest freshwater lake in the world is Lake Superior, covering about 82,100 km² (31,700 sq mi) on the US–Canada border. By volume, the largest is Russia’s Lake Baikal, which holds about a fifth of the world’s unfrozen fresh surface water. The bigger Caspian Sea is salty, so it doesn’t count.
Three ways to measure “largest”
| Measure | Winner | Size |
|---|---|---|
| Surface area (fresh water) | Lake Superior | ~82,100 km² |
| Volume (fresh water) | Lake Baikal | ~23,600 km³ |
| Largest lake of any kind | Caspian Sea | ~371,000 km², brackish |
Lake Superior
- Shared by Ontario (Canada) and Minnesota, Wisconsin and Michigan (US)
- Big enough to hold all the water in the other four Great Lakes, plus three more Lake Eries
- Its storms are famous for sinking ships, including the SS Edmund Fitzgerald in 1975
Lakes Michigan and Huron are connected at the Straits of Mackinac and share the same water level. Hydrologically, some scientists treat them as one lake, which would be larger than Superior. The Great Lakes give Michigan its long shoreline; see which state has the longest freshwater shoreline.
Lake Baikal
- In Siberia, Russia
- The deepest lake on Earth, about 1,642 m (5,387 ft)
- The oldest lake, about 25 million years old
- Home to the Baikal seal, one of the only freshwater seals
The world’s largest freshwater lakes by area
| Rank | Lake | Location | Area (approx.) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Superior | US/Canada | 82,100 km² |
| 2 | Victoria | Uganda/Kenya/Tanzania | 68,800 km² |
| 3 | Huron | US/Canada | 59,600 km² |
| 4 | Michigan | US | 58,000 km² |
| 5 | Tanganyika | East Africa | 32,900 km² |
See the largest lake in Africa. For the deepest lake in the US, see Crater Lake. For a country of lakes, read which country has the most lakes.
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