Lake Constance — Water balance
Current discharge at the stations included so far. Major German tributaries are still missing from this partial balance.
Partial balance: German tributaries are missing
Discharge from the Argen, Schussen and other German tributaries is not yet included. We are clarifying the terms for their ongoing use. This difference is therefore not a complete balance for Lake Constance and cannot reliably show its current water-level trend.
Partially recorded · 19 readings
Measured water balance
Updated 16 minutes ago
How to read the water balance: the difference compares only the inflows and outflows recorded here, in cubic metres per second. A positive value means these stations record more inflow than outflow; a negative value means the opposite. Not all tributaries are included, and rain on the lake, evaporation and groundwater are also missing. This value alone therefore shows neither the lake's full volume change nor a reliable water-level trend.
Where does the water come from?
Where does it flow to?
Rain and inflow
How Alpenrhein, Diepoldsau (Zufluss) responds to rainfall over the last 30 days.
- Rain
- Alpenrhein, Diepoldsau (Zufluss)
How to read: the bars show daily precipitation in the catchment (mm, left axis), the line the largest measured tributary (right axis). This shows whether and how quickly the lake responds to rain – inflow usually follows precipitation with some delay.
Drinking water from the lake
Annual figures, as of 2024-10Around 5M people drink water from this lake; 17 utilities draw it. Unlike inflow and outflow these are not continuous measurements but published annual figures — shown here in the same unit as the balance above so both can be compared directly.
5.39 m³/s
Actual extraction
1.5 % of inflow
4.25 m³/s
Removed from the lake
1.2 % of inflow
10.65 m³/s
Permitted maximum
2.9 % of inflow
361.50 m³/s
Total inflow
Tributaries and precipitation
All drinking water extraction together amounts to 1.5 % of what flows into the lake. Even if every permit were used in full it would be 2.9 %. Much of the extracted water also returns to the lake after treatment. For the lake level, the outflow, hydropower use and weather matter by orders of magnitude more than drinking water.
Largest single abstractor: Bodensee-Wasserversorgung with 4.12 m³/s.