Japan Waterfall

Akiu Great Falls

A 55 m drop.

When to go

No machine-readable author provided. Crown of Lenten rose assumed (based on copyright clai · CC BY 3.0

In numbers.

55m

Height

2.2m³/s

Average flow

estimate

Jul–Aug
Oct–Nov

Best months

1.2MW

Water power

estimate

The water at Akiu Great Falls, month by month

It roars from March to April and from July to January.

It carries water fairly evenly through the year.

2.9 m³/sJan
1.3 m³/sFeb
3.0 m³/sMar
3.1 m³/sApr
1.7 m³/sMay
1.0 m³/sJun
3.8 m³/sJul
3.9 m³/sAug
3.3 m³/sSep
4.0 m³/sOct
3.7 m³/sNov
3.5 m³/sDec

high water best months to go

From about 1.0 m³/s in the lowest month to 4.0 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from July to August and from October to November.

Estimate: the timing comes from rain, snowmelt and evaporation (NASA POWER, 1991–2020); the amounts from the river model of HydroATLAS (WaterGAP, 1971–2000). Dams upstream can change the real flow.

Waterfall in Sendai, Miyagi Prefecture, Japan

Akiu Great Falls is a waterfall in Japan. The water falls 55 m over a front 6 m wide.

Getting there.

Kawasakinearest town · 12 km in a straight line
Parking 140 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
Yamagata Airport (GAJ)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 25 km in a straight lineCar hire at SYO airport (Shonai)Discover Cars · Affiliate link
From July to August and from October to Novemberbest months to go (estimate)

Plan your visit

Stay, explore and get there

Car hire at SYO airport (Shonai)Discover CarsSee

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.

How big is it?

How big it really is.

Height of the drop from Wikidata. Buildings and the person are drawn at the same scale.

1.2 MW

About 2.2 m³/s falling 55 m: the power of the water as it drops.

enough to power about 300 homes, if it were all turned into electricity

Power of falling water = density × gravity × flow × height. Average flow and height as shown above; an estimate.

Seen from the sky.

8 × 8 km of cloud-free satellite image, with what OpenStreetMap knows around the falls.

Akiu Great Falls seen from above (Sentinel-2)

N 2 km

Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.

The 名取川 through the falls

The line follows the river as mapped in OpenStreetMap; heights from the 30 m Copernicus model, which smooths narrow drops — the published height of the falls is the one above.

The valley below the falls

Around the falls the river drops 75 m in 2.4 km. Here the river runs about 88 m below the lower rim of its valley.

What is around.

—viewpoints
—waymarked walking routes
5car parks
—swimming spots
—picnic sites
1toilets
2information boards and visitor centres
3bus stops within 1 km
—other named waterfalls within 4 km
—caves
4campsites立石沢, 五合目, 二口キャンプ場 and 1 more
2hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 kmLa楽リゾートHotel, 湯の原ホテル
8restaurants and cafés within 3 km

Counted in OpenStreetMap, the map anyone can edit, up to 2 km around the falls (unless noted). A low number may just mean nobody has mapped it yet. © OpenStreetMap contributors (ODbL).

Towns nearby

Kawasaki12 km in a straight line
Murata20 km in a straight line
Nagano21 km in a straight line
Yamagata21 km in a straight line
Tendō22 km in a straight line
Sendai23 km in a straight line

Weather

The weather, month by month.

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
Afternoon °C	1	1	6	13	19	24	27	28	24	17	11	4
Night °C	-5	-5	-2	3	9	14	18	19	15	8	3	-2
Rain & snow (mm)	126	80	93	92	94	116	204	168	142	154	127	150
Wet days	23	19	16	13	12	13	17	15	16	16	19	23
Sun h/day	2.6	3.5	4.5	5.6	5.8	5.2	3.7	4.9	4.4	4.0	3.3	2.2
Snow on the ground (cm)	24	27	14	3	0	0	0	0	0	0	4	16

Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (260 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.

Photos

Through visitors' eyes.

Akiu waterfalls (51962914612) — Raita Futo from Tokyo, Japan · CC BY 2.0

Akiu waterfalls (51964200144) — Raita Futo from Tokyo, Japan · CC BY 2.0

Akiu Falls 2008 — Crown of Lenten rose · CC BY 3.0

Recent years

Wet years and dry years

Rain of each month as a share of the 1991–2020 average. A wet season above 100 % usually means a fuller waterfall.

	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
2020	100%	119%	109%	168%	66%	67%	221%	80%	147%	60%	73%	99%
2021	98%	158%	98%	117%	103%	67%	77%	99%	75%	86%	145%	143%
2022	98%	111%	121%	106%	85%	138%	88%	153%	83%	62%	94%	141%
2023	74%	98%	80%	106%	199%	230%	85%	28%	133%	81%	138%	95%
2024	121%	87%	145%	81%	130%	87%	214%	96%	173%	86%	113%	88%
2025	94%	112%	88%	148%	223%	87%	11%	147%	223%	148%	110%	113%

130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual

Compare with the waterfalls nearby.

Akiu Great Falls

Japan

55 mHeight
2.2 m³/sAverage flow
Jul–Aug, Oct–NovBest months

Sankai Falls

Japan

181 mHeight
—Average flow
Jul–OctBest months

See the guide

Namekawa Great Falls

Japan

—Height
0.20 m³/sAverage flow
Jul–OctBest months

See the guide

Nanatsu Falls

Japan

—Height
—Average flow
Jul–Aug, Oct–NovBest months

See the guide

About these numbers

Names, height, width, river	Wikidata (Q4701257) · CC0
River flow and catchment	HydroATLAS / RiverATLAS v1.0 (Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0
Climate	NASA POWER, 1991–2020
Relief, river profile, 3D model	Copernicus DEM GLO-30 · © DLR e.V., © Airbus Defence and Space GmbH, Copernicus/ESA
Paths, viewpoints, parking	© OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL
Images	EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons

Every figure is an average, an estimate or a count from a public dataset. Licences and methods: data sources.