Friday, Jul 24, 2026 The claims desk. Receipts included. POWERED BY LENZ ↗
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GENERAL

The Claim

Lake Baikal in Russia is the deepest lake in the world, with a maximum depth of 1,642 meters.

Verified by Lenz ·

The Short Version

Available evidence consistently identifies Lake Baikal as the world’s deepest lake. The 1,642-meter figure is a documented maximum depth used by some references, although other authoritative sources give approximate values such as 1,637 meters or simply “over 1,600 meters.” That small variation reflects measurement and reporting differences, not a real dispute about Baikal’s status.

Caveats

  • The exact maximum depth is not reported uniformly across authoritative sources; some list about 1,637 m rather than 1,642 m.
  • One database entry giving 1,741 m is an outlier and is not supported by most other credible references.
  • The claim is strongest when read as a statement about Baikal’s status as the deepest lake, not as a universally settled single-number measurement.

The Receipts

  1. Lake Baikal - A Touchstone for Global Change and Rift Studies

    U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)

  2. Lake Baikal from space, the largest, oldest, and deepest lake

    U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)

  3. Lake Baikal: The Sacred Sea of Siberia

    NASA Earth Observatory

  4. Lake Baikal: Protecting the world’s deepest lake

    United Nations News

  5. Lake Baikal

    International Lake Environment Committee (ILEC) – World Lake Database

  6. Lake Baikal

    Freshwater Ecoregions of the World (FEOW)

  7. Lake Baikal

    NASA Earth Observatory

  8. The World's Deepest Lakes

    U.S. National Park Service

  9. Lake Baikal: Details and information

    Baikalex

  10. Baikal: Diving into the world's deepest lake

    Armatus Oceanic

+ 5 more sources — see the full list on Lenz

Filed Under

Lake BaikalRussian Empire

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