Image: Wikimedia Commons

lake

Body of relatively still water, localized in a basin

Also known as lakes

Instance of: feature type
Subclass of: still waters
, open water
, landform
+1 more

Overview

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia · Read full article · Text CC BY-SA 4.0

A lake is often a naturally occurring, relatively large and fixed body of water on or near the Earth's surface. It is localized in a basin or interconnected basins surrounded by dry land. Lakes lie completely on land and are separate from the ocean, although they may be connected with the ocean by outflowing rivers. Lakes, like other bodies of water, are part of the water cycle, the processes by which water moves around the Earth. Most lakes are fresh water and account for almost all the world's surface freshwater, but some are salt lakes with salinities even higher than that of seawater. Lakes vary significantly in surface area and volume of water, but in total cover approximately 2.5 × 106 km2 (less than 2%) of the Earth's surface.

Overview

All data

123 statements · 10% with external sources · numbers in brackets are citations

On other databases

83 identifiers linking lake across the web's reference databases

Data quality

123

statements

10%

externally sourced

Source last edited September 14, 2026. AIDB refreshes this page daily.

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Cite this page

AIDB. (2026). lake (Q23397). Retrieved from https://aidb.si/e/lake-Q23397