Lakes of Uri 2026: 29 lakes, 17 above 2,000 m

Everyone thinks of Lake Uri. Most of Uri's lakes are somewhere else. Where? ↓

Uri and water brings Lake Uri to mind. Yet most of the canton's lakes are high in the mountains: 17 of 29 above 2,000 m, the highest at 2443 m.

Number of lakes in Uri: 29

29 lakes of half a hectare or more, and yet the national map shows 444 bodies of standing water in Uri. The gap is not imprecision; it is a way of counting.

Anyone reading a different figure has almost always drawn a different line: count every water surface and Uri has 444; count only lakes over one square kilometre and you get 2. Even a plain name such as "Weiher" counts as official: what decides is the entry in the swissNAMES3D gazetteer. Our count states where the line is, so it can be checked.

Lake Finder: find any lake in Uri

Largest lake in Uri: Göscheneralpsee

The largest lake touching Uri is the Vierwaldstättersee (113.9 km²), but only 17% of its surface lies in the canton. The largest lake belonging entirely to the canton is the Göscheneralpsee: 1.29 km² at 1789 m.

Highest lake in Uri: Tschingelsee

The highest lake in Uri is also one of the smallest: the Tschingelsee in Silenen lies at 2443 m and covers 1.1 ha; only 6 of the 29 lakes are smaller.

The canton's lowest-lying lake is the Vierwaldstättersee at 434 m. The canton's median lake sits at 2080 m. Elevation is the water level in the landscape model; for reservoirs it varies with how full they are. 2 of the 29 lakes in the canton have a dam or embankment (structures in swissTLM3D): Göscheneralpsee and Arnisee.

Shared lakes: which lakes Uri shares

89% of the lake surface in Uri lies in lakes it does not own alone. Uri shares 1 of its 29 lakes with other cantons; the table shows how much of each lies in the canton.

List of lakes in Uri

27 of the 29 lakes in Uri together cover less area than a single lake, Göscheneralpsee: 1.03 km² against 1.29 km². An official name does not make a lake: 14 of the 43 named bodies of water in Uri measure less than half a hectare. The list shows all of them by area, the 29 lakes first, the smaller ones marked.

Lakes by size: 22 of 29 under 5 ha

22 of the 29 lakes in Uri are smaller than five hectares. 4 are larger than ten hectares, which puts Uri at rank 14 of the 26 cantons.

Measured by area, the small lakes almost vanish: the 22 of the 29 lakes of half a hectare or more that stay under five hectares together cover about 2% of the lake surface in Uri. Vierwaldstättersee, counting only its part in the canton, alone covers 89%.

Lakes by municipality: Silenen has the most

The municipality with the most lakes is not on the canton's largest lake (Vierwaldstättersee): Silenen, with 6 lakes, all above 1400 m. Counted are lakes lying entirely within the canton and in no more than two municipalities; a large lake belongs to many. The Lake Finder can search by municipality.

• Silenen6Seewli · Golzerensee · Hüfisee · Spillauisee · Bristensee · Tschingelsee
• Gurtnellen4Arnisee · Nidersee · Obersee · Hinterseeli
• Andermatt3Oberalpsee · Lutersee · Wildenmattensee
• Erstfeld3Obersee · Fulensee · Leidsee
• Göschenen2Göscheneralpsee · Bergsee
• Seelisberg2Seeli · Wijer
• Sisikon2Spilauer See · Alpler See
• Wassen2Gross See · Chli See

More lake pages

Written by

Marco Gisler

ConvivaPlus Editor · Data & Switzerland

Writes about Switzerland in figures – official data recalculated, counting method explained.

• Population
• 26 cantons
• Waterways
• Official data

Researched & sourced · for Switzerland

Profile & all articles →·Our editorial teamUpdated 25.10.2026

Source: swisstopo (swissTLM3D, swissNAMES3D, swissBOUNDARIES3D, 2026 edition), analysis by ConvivaPlus. Switzerland as a whole: 891 lakes out of 17'873 water surfaces; parts with the same name no more than 50 m apart count as one lake. Area = water surface at the shoreline of the landscape model; reference works using a different shoreline or water level sometimes give other values.