Lakes of Africa: The Major Ones, Their Sizes and How They Formed
Africa's biggest lakes are Victoria, Tanganyika, Malawi, Turkana, Chad and Volta. Most of the deep ones sit in the East African Rift, which is why they are long, narrow and thousands of metres deep. This piece lists the major lakes with area and depth, explains the three ways they formed, and covers the shrinking of Lake Chad.
Africa's biggest lakes are Victoria, Tanganyika, Malawi, Turkana, Chad and Volta. Most of the deep ones sit in the East African Rift, which is why they are long, narrow and thousands of metres deep. This piece lists the major lakes with area and depth, explains the three ways they formed, and covers the shrinking of Lake Chad.
The major lakes, ranked by surface area
Lake Victoria is the largest lake in Africa at about 68,800 sq km, shared by Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya. Lake Tanganyika is the deepest at roughly 1,470 m, second deepest in the world after Baikal. After those two come Malawi, Turkana, Chad and Albert, then a long tail of smaller lakes. Volta is the odd one out on the list because a dam made it in 1965.
Note how the numbers behave. Victoria is huge but shallow, around 80 m at its deepest. Tanganyika covers less than half Victoria's area yet holds far more water. That difference is not a coincidence, and the next section explains it.
| Lake | Approx. area (sq km) | Max depth (m) | Countries |
|---|---|---|---|
| Victoria | 68,800 | 80 | Tanzania, Uganda, Kenya |
| Tanganyika | 32,600 | 1,470 | Tanzania, DR Congo, Burundi, Zambia |
| Malawi (Nyasa) | 29,600 | 706 | Malawi, Mozambique, Tanzania |
| Turkana | 6,400 | 109 | Kenya, Ethiopia |
| Volta (man-made) | 8,500 | 75 | Ghana |
| Albert | 5,300 | 51 | Uganda, DR Congo |
| Chad | 1,300 to 25,000 (varies) | under 11 | Chad, Cameroon, Niger, Nigeria |
| Kariba (man-made) | 5,600 | 97 | Zambia, Zimbabwe |
| Tana | 3,000 | 14 | Ethiopia |
| Kivu | 2,700 | 480 | Rwanda, DR Congo |
Why the deep ones are long and narrow
Draw a line down East Africa from Ethiopia to Mozambique. The continent is splitting there. Two arms of the East African Rift pull apart, the crust drops in blocks between faults, and water collects in the trenches. That gives you Tanganyika, Malawi, Kivu, Turkana, Albert and Edward. All of them are stretched north to south, steep sided, and deep out of proportion to their width. Tanganyika is about 673 km long and averages only 50 km across.
Victoria formed differently. It sits in a shallow sag between the two rift arms, on a broad plateau that got warped downward as the rift shoulders lifted. No deep fault trench, so no depth. It is basically a wide puddle on a tilted tableland, which is why a few metres of lake level change can move its shoreline by kilometres.
A third group has nothing to do with the rift. Lake Chad is an endorheic basin lake in the Sahel, fed mostly by the Chari and Logone rivers, with no outlet to the sea. Lake Nakuru and Lake Natron are shallow soda lakes on rift valley floors, alkaline because water leaves by evaporation and the salts stay behind.
- Rift lakes (Tanganyika, Malawi, Turkana, Kivu, Albert, Edward): tectonic, deep, elongated
- Downwarp lake (Victoria): shallow, roughly rounded, huge area
- Inland basin lakes (Chad, Ngami): endorheic, saline or fresh depending on inflow
- Crater lakes (Nyos in Cameroon): volcanic, small, sometimes gas charged
- Reservoirs (Volta, Kariba, Nasser, Cahora Bassa): built in the 1950s to 1970s
Lake Chad, and why the numbers keep changing
Lake Chad is the lake most often asked about, because its area is not a fixed figure. In the 1960s it covered roughly 25,000 sq km. By the mid 1980s it was down to about 1,350 sq km, a drop of over 90 percent. The causes stack up: a long Sahel drought from the late 1960s onward, and heavy irrigation withdrawal from the Chari and Logone, which supply most of the inflow.
The lake is absurdly shallow, mostly under 5 m, which is exactly why it responds so fast. Lose a bit of depth and you lose vast areas of surface. Satellite data since the 2000s shows partial recovery in the southern pool, and the northern pool now dries out in some years. When you see conflicting area figures for Lake Chad, both are probably right for their year.
The lakes that people made
Not every large African lake is natural. Lake Volta in Ghana, dammed at Akosombo in 1965, has the largest surface area of any reservoir on Earth, around 8,500 sq km. Lake Kariba on the Zambezi, finished in 1959, holds more water than Volta despite covering less ground, and it is the largest man-made reservoir by volume. Lake Nasser sits behind the Aswan High Dam on the Nile, completed in 1970, and stretches into northern Sudan where it is called Lake Nubia.
Each one displaced people. Kariba moved about 57,000 Tonga; Akosombo moved roughly 80,000; Aswan relocated over 100,000 Nubians. If you are studying these for an exam, the resettlement figures get asked as often as the dam heights.
What to actually remember
Three facts carry most of the weight. Victoria is the largest by area and the second largest freshwater lake in the world. Tanganyika is the deepest in Africa and holds about 16 percent of the planet's available fresh surface water. And the whole eastern chain of deep lakes exists because a continent is tearing itself in two along the Great Rift Valley.
Beyond that, learn positions rather than lists. Turkana in the north of Kenya, Victoria on the equator between the rift arms, Malawi at the southern end of the western chain reaching into Mozambique. Once the map is in your head, the area and depth figures stop being trivia and start making sense.
FAQs
Which is the largest lake in Africa?
Lake Victoria, at about 68,800 sq km. It is also the world's second largest freshwater lake by area after Lake Superior, and it is shared by Tanzania, Uganda and Kenya.
Which African lake is the deepest?
Lake Tanganyika, with a maximum depth of around 1,470 m. Only Lake Baikal in Siberia is deeper, and Tanganyika holds roughly 16 percent of the world's available fresh surface water.
How many Great Lakes does Africa have?
The African Great Lakes are usually counted as Victoria, Tanganyika, Malawi, Turkana, Albert, Kivu and Edward, so seven. Some lists restrict the term to the three biggest: Victoria, Tanganyika and Malawi.
Which is the largest man-made lake in Africa?
Lake Volta in Ghana, created by the Akosombo Dam in 1965, with a surface area of about 8,500 sq km. By volume, Lake Kariba on the Zambezi is larger.
Why are East African lakes salty?
Lakes like Natron, Nakuru and Magadi have no outlet to the sea, so water leaves only by evaporation and dissolved salts accumulate. Volcanic rocks in the rift floor add sodium carbonate, which makes them alkaline soda lakes rather than simply salty.
Which river drains Lake Victoria?
The Victoria Nile leaves the lake at Jinja in Uganda, flows into Lake Kyoga and then Lake Albert, and continues north as the Albert Nile. It eventually becomes the White Nile in South Sudan.