Lake
Vänern
Natural Earth’s outline of Vänern measures about 5,750 km² (2,220 mi²), the 25th largest of the 104 lakes on sizeversus, and about the same size as Brunei.
50 km
- Vänern
- Brunei
The numbers
- 5,750km²Area, measured2,220 mi² · Natural Earth outline
- 5,650km²Area, publishedWikidata · agrees within 2%
- 106mGreatest depthaverage about 26.6 m
- 153km³VolumeWikidata
- 44mAbove 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 Vänern
- The Caspian Sea (called a sea or a lake, depending on the definition), the largest of the 104 lakes ranked on sizeversus, is 65.9× the size of Vänern; Vänern ranks 25th.
- Vänern sits between Issyk-Kul (6,260 km²) and Nettilling Lake (5,450 km²) in the ranking.
- Counted as a country, Vänern would be larger than 44 of the 212 countries listed on sizeversus and would rank 169th by area, between Palestine (6,070 km²) and Brunei (5,720 km²).
- It is larger than 3 of the 51 US states and districts (the biggest of them is Delaware, 5,170 km²) and smaller than 48.
- It is smaller than every one of the 31 provinces and regions of China.
- The closest US state is Delaware (5,170 km²): Vänern is 1.11× the size of Delaware.
- Wikidata records a greatest depth of 106 m; with its volume that gives an average depth of about 27 m.
- Wikidata records a volume of 153 km³. Poured over Brunei (5,720 km²), that water would stand 27 m deep.
- Its surface lies about 44 m above sea level (Wikidata).
- On a standard web map (Web Mercator), a place at 59°N is drawn about 3.8× too large in area, so Vänern looks bigger there than it is.
- Laid out flat, Vänern stretches about 117 km north to south and 105 km east to west.
- Wikidata’s published figure of 5,650 km² agrees with our measured 5,750 km², to within 2%.
About the same size as
Countries
On the shore
Natural Earth’s outlines of Sweden contain or lie within 4 km of the outline of Vänern. That is what its geometry says, and it is not a statement about who owns the water or where any border runs in it.
Where Vänern ranks
Vänern is the 25th largest of the 104 lakes on sizeversus, ranked by measured area.
Compare Vänern
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