River
Lepsy River
417 km from source to mouth · Kazakhstan.
KazakhstanFlows into Lake Balkhash
In numbers
Length
417km
Average flow
19m³/s
Basin
8,040km²
Drop
2,024m
from 2,362 m to 338 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
417 km of river and 1 stops on the way: 0 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmSourceat 2,362 m
- 30 kmZhasylkol Lake0.8 km²
- 417 kmLake Balkhashat 338 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in Kazakhstan
At the mouth it carries 19 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 134 seconds. It drops from 2,362 m to 338 m, 4.9 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 8,040 km², about the size of PR. 38,000 people live in it. Highest water, with the snowmelt: from April to May; lowest: from January to March and September. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- MatayLargest city on its banks · 4,139 people
- Taldykorgan Airport (TDK)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 89 km from the cityCar hire at ALA airport (Almaty)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- From May to SeptemberThe best months to visit
Lepsy River, month by month
Highest water: from April to May
Lowest water: from January to March and September. Freezing months (average below −4 °C): from December to February. Melting snow makes up much of its water. Best months to visit: from May to September.
From about 1.2 m³/s in the lowest month to 140 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.
Plan the trip
Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
The basin
Lepsy River: the basin in numbers
10,389 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 38,000people live in the basin
- 4/km²people per km²
- 952maverage altitude of the basin
- 339mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 4.7°Caverage air temperature
- 12%protected areas
- 0.2%covered by lakes
- 6%permafrost
What covers the basin
- 3% Forest
- 9% Cropland
- 71% Pasture
RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.
Along the river
Lepsy River: what you find on the way
- 1Weirs
From OpenStreetMap, within 1.8 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Lepsy River in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
1lake on its wayLakeyas
1mountain at the sourcePeakyas
Lakes and reservoirs (1)
Lakes it flows through, by Lakeyas
- Zhasylkol Lakekm 24 · 50 m deep0.8km²
Lakeyas is coming soonOpen Lakeyas ↗
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (1)
Also: Aganokty
Nearby
Rivers nearby
Kazakhstan316 km11 m³/s11 km awayAyaguz RiverKazakhstan492 km8.8 m³/s73 km awayKaratal RiverKazakhstan390 km67 m³/s91 km awayIli RiverKazakhstan1,439 km480 m³/s316 km awayCharyn RiverKazakhstan427 km35 m³/s290 km awayChilik RiverKazakhstan245 km32 m³/s290 km awayChong-Kemin River
Kyrgyzstan116 km22 m³/s455 km awayUba RiverKazakhstan278 km180 m³/s492 km awayWhere these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q1046455) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed from the source to the mouth given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Lakeyas, Peakyas — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?
Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.
beaches
Find your beach: sea temperature, sun and swimming month by month.Visit lakes
Every lake on Earth: water temperature, ice, depth and the shore.Coming soonVisit mountains
Every summit in 3D: summit weather, the 0 °C line, huts and trails.Visit 
waterfalls
Every waterfall: height, flow month by month and when it roars.Coming soonVisit 
islands
Every island from the sea up: size, sea temperature, ferries and 3D.Coming soonVisit 
rivers
Every river from source to sea: the journey, the flow and the basin in numbers.You are here
canyons
Every canyon cut to scale: depth to the floor, rim and floor temperatures, trails and viewpoints.Coming soonVisit