Lake
Lake Erie
Natural Earth’s outline of Lake Erie measures about 25,700 km² (9,940 mi²), the 11th largest of the 104 lakes on sizeversus, and about the same size as North Macedonia.
100 km
- Lake Erie
- North Macedonia
The numbers
- 25,700km²Area, measured9,940 mi² · Natural Earth outline
- 25,700km²Area, publishedWikidata · agrees within 2%
- 65mGreatest depthaverage about 18.8 m
- 483km³VolumeWikidata
- 173mAbove sea levelSurface, Wikidata
The area is measured from the outline drawn above, on the WGS84 ellipsoid; the published figure is shown beside it, and a water body is kept only if the two are within 10%.
What the numbers say about Lake Erie
- The Caspian Sea (called a sea or a lake, depending on the definition), the largest of the 104 lakes ranked on sizeversus, is 14.7× the size of Lake Erie; Lake Erie ranks 11th.
- Lake Erie sits between Great Slave Lake (26,100 km²) and Lake Winnipeg (24,800 km²) in the ranking.
- Counted as a country, Lake Erie would be larger than 65 of the 212 countries listed on sizeversus and would rank 148th by area, between Equatorial Guinea (26,700 km²) and North Macedonia (25,400 km²).
- It is larger than 10 of the 51 US states and districts (the biggest of them is Maryland, 25,500 km²) and smaller than 41.
- It is larger than 3 of the 31 provinces and regions of China (the biggest of them is Beijing, 16,300 km²) and smaller than 28.
- The closest US state is Maryland (25,500 km²): Lake Erie is about the same size as Maryland.
- Wikidata records a greatest depth of 65 m; with its volume that gives an average depth of about 19 m.
- Wikidata records a volume of 483 km³. Poured over Belgium (30,700 km²), that water would stand 16 m deep.
- Its surface lies about 173 m above sea level (Wikidata).
- On a standard web map (Web Mercator), a place at 42°N is drawn about 1.8× too large in area, so Lake Erie looks bigger there than it is.
- Laid out flat, Lake Erie stretches about 192 km north to south and 378 km east to west.
- Wikidata’s published figure of 25,700 km² agrees with our measured 25,700 km², to within 2%.
About the same size as
Countries
On the shore
Natural Earth’s outlines of the United States and Canada contain or lie within 4 km of the outline of Lake Erie. That is what its geometry says, and it is not a statement about who owns the water or where any border runs in it.
Names
- Lake Eriethe name in this page’s titlesource: Wikidata’s English label
- Great Lakesalso calledsource: Natural Earth
- Eriealso calledsource: Natural Earth
Where Lake Erie ranks
Lake Erie is the 11th largest of the 104 lakes on sizeversus, ranked by measured area.
Compare Lake Erie
Share this outline
Sources and method
- Outline
- Natural Earth, 1:10m Lakes + Reservoirs, public domain (Lakes + Reservoirs). Outlines of lakes are drawn at 1:10 million.
- Boundary
- A lake or a sea has no legal boundary of its own. The outline is a cartographic one, and the page says so by showing the measured area beside the published one.
- Area basis
- Measured outline: computed on the WGS84 ellipsoid from the full-detail outline and shown rounded. Published figure: Wikidata (CC0), fetched 2026-11-11. An outline is kept within 10% of the published figure and matched to other places automatically within 5%.
- Depth, volume, height
- As recorded in Wikidata; a volume that cannot be right for the area and depth is left out.
- Shore
- Countries whose Natural Earth outline contains or comes close to the water's outline; computed, not a statement of ownership.
- Drawing
- Each outline is projected with an equal-area projection centred on its own centroid, so areas stay true and two can be laid over each other.
- Data built
- 2026-11-11