River
Mat
115 km from source to mouth · Albania.
AlbaniaFlows into Adriatic Sea8th longest in Albania
In numbers
Length
115km
Average flow
100m³/s
Basin
2,441km²
Drop
424m
from 422 m to -2 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
115 km of river and 10 stops on the way: 4 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmSourceat 422 m
- 15 kmKlos7,873 people
- 38 kmBurrel7,928 people
- 63 kmLake Ulza8.7 km²
- 63 kmUlëz1,229 people
- 77 kmLake Shkopet1.1 km²
- 86 kmFantributary
- 92 kmZogu Bridge
- 94 kmMilot2,157 people
- 96 kmBridge of Milot
- 100 kmMat River Bridge
- 115 kmAdriatic Seaat -2 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in northern Albania
At the mouth it carries 103 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 24 seconds. It drops from 422 m to -2 m, 3.7 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 2,441 km², about the size of RE. 102,000 people live in it. Highest water: from December to January; lowest: from June to September. Dams and reservoirs hold back a large share of its water (18% of a year's flow).
Where to start
- BurrelLargest city on its banks · 7,928 people
- Tirana International Airport Mother Teresa (TIA)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 32 km from the cityCar hire at TIA airport (Rinas)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- From June to AugustThe best months to visit
Mat, month by month
Highest water: from December to January
Lowest water: from June to September. Best months to visit: from June to August.
From about 17 m³/s in the lowest month to 110 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
Mat: the basin in numbers
2,507 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 102,000people live in the basin
- 41/km²people per km²
- 731maverage altitude of the basin
- 1,220mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 10.8°Caverage air temperature
- 0.4%covered by lakes
- 0.4km³held in reservoirs
What covers the basin
- 42% Forest
- 9% Cropland
- 12% Pasture
- 2% 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
Mat: what you find on the way
- 1Weirs
From OpenStreetMap, within 1.4 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Mat 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.
2lakes on its wayLakeyas
1beach at the mouth or on the banksCoastya
70mountains at the sourcePeakyas
1island off the mouthIslandyas
Lakes and reservoirs (2)
Lakes it flows through, by Lakeyas
- Lake Ulzakm 438.7km²
- Lake Shkopetkm 531.1km²
Lakeyas is coming soonOpen Lakeyas ↗
Beaches (1)
At the mouth (25 km) and on the banks, by Coastya
- Plazhi i Shëngjinit18 km away25.1°C
Mountains at the source (70)
Within 15 km of the source, by Peakyas
- Mali i Lopës10 km away2,020m
- Mali me Gropa12 km away1,848m
- Maja e Plakthit12 km away1,936m
- Maja e Vjervakut13 km away1,709m
- Malesia e Martan Eshit10 km away1,677m
- Shkembi i Mucas12 km away1,667m
- Maja e Qafa e Shtylles8.6 km away1,644m
- Maja e Majazit13 km away1,636m
62 more on PeakyasOpen Peakyas ↗
Islands off the mouth (1)
Within 30 km of the mouth, by Islandyas
- Kunë Island13 km away1.4km²
Islandyas is coming soonOpen Islandyas ↗
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
Mat in pictures

Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (1)
Also: Fan
Nearby
Rivers nearby
Where these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q519866) · 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, Coastya, Peakyas, Islandyas — 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.