Lake · Namibia
Lake Liambezi
Lake Liambezi is a shallow lake in the far north-east of Namibia, right next to the border with Botswana. When floods fill it, it is the largest lake in Namibia – but it often dries up for years.
Picture credit: Hp.Baumeler (CC BY-SA 4.0) · Hp.Baumeler (CC BY-SA 4.0) · Wikimedia Commons
Where is Lake Liambezi?
Countries on its shores: Namibia.
Largest lake of: Namibia.
Middle of the lake: 17.92° S, 24.29° E
The story behind it
Lake Liambezi lies in a flat plain in Namibia's Zambezi Region. It only fills when the Zambezi and Kwando rivers carry so much water that they spill over into it. Then it can become very big: it usually covers up to about 100 km², and after the great floods of 2010 and 2011 it even reached about 370 km². At its deepest it was about 7 metres, but most of it is only around 2.5 metres deep. When the floods stay away, the lake dries out. It was dry from 1985 until 2005/06 and has mostly dried up again since the middle of the 2010s. While there is water, the lake is full of fish: 46 kinds of fish have been found, and local fishers catch big tilapias. Namibia has no permanent freshwater lakes of any size, so when Lake Liambezi is full, it is the country's largest lake.
Find it on the globe
Lake Liambezi is there as a small blue dot with its name, right on the water. From far away the planet is only a blue ball; detail arrives as you zoom in, and this one appears once you are close enough. Open it on the globe.
It sits at its real coordinates, not near them — the same numbers listed in the facts above. Switch off the layer for this kind of place and it disappears again; the buttons for that are down the right-hand edge.
Questions children ask
How big is Lake Liambezi?
When it is full, it usually covers up to about 100 km²; after the big floods of 2010 and 2011 it reached about 370 km². In dry years it can disappear completely.
Why does Lake Liambezi dry up?
It only gets water when the Zambezi and Kwando rivers flood and spill into it. If the floods stay away for several years, the water evaporates and the lake dries out.
Is Lake Liambezi the largest lake in Namibia?
Yes, when it is full. The Etosha Pan is bigger, but it is a salt pan that is usually dry, not a lake.
Where these numbers come from
Every figure on this page was checked against public reference sources before publication. Where sources genuinely disagree, the text says so.
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