River
Lilongwe River
200 km from source to mouth · Malawi.
MalawiFlows into Lake Malawi2nd longest in Malawi
In numbers
Length
200km
Average flow
44m³/s
Basin
8,176km²
Drop
689m
from 1,163 m to 474 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
200 km of river and 2 stops on the way: 2 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmSourceat 1,163 m
- 67 kmLilongwe989,318 people
- 179 kmSalima41,492 people
- 200 kmLake Malawiat 474 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in Malawi
At the mouth it carries 44 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 57 seconds. It drops from 1,163 m to 474 m, 3.4 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 8,176 km², about the size of PR. 2.6 million people live in it. Highest water: from February to March; lowest: from July to October. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- LilongweLargest city on its banks · 989,318 people
- Kamuzu International Airport (LLW)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 22 km from the cityCar hire in LilongweDiscover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- On the water5 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
- From May to SeptemberThe best months to visit
Lilongwe River, month by month
Highest water: from February to March
Lowest water: from July to October. Best months to visit: from May to September.
From about 5.2 m³/s in the lowest month to 130 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
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The basin
Lilongwe River: the basin in numbers
8,176 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 2.6millionpeople live in the basin
- 315/km²people per km²
- 1,161maverage altitude of the basin
- 915mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 19.7°Caverage air temperature
- 18%protected areas
What covers the basin
- 16% Forest
- 20% Cropland
- 15% Pasture
- 27% Towns and cities
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
Lilongwe River: what you find on the way
- 3Weirs
- 5Boat ramps
From OpenStreetMap, within 1.7 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Lilongwe 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.
3mountains at the sourcePeakyas
Mountains at the source (3)
Within 15 km of the source, by Peakyas
- Silamwezi Hill11 km away
- Kasitu Rock12 km away
- Monte Metuansombe12 km away
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.
Photos
Lilongwe River in pictures
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Mozambique
Zambia
NamibiaWhere these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q1825272) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed along the river network from the point 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 | 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.
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Every river from source to sea: the journey, the flow and the basin in numbers.You are here
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