
In numbers.
85m
Height
34m³/s
Average flow
estimate
May–Jun
Sep–Oct
Best months
28MW
Water power
estimate
The water at Montmorency Falls, month by month
It roars from April to May.
The fullest months: from April to May. The thinnest: February. Below −4 °C on average (from December to March): the falls can partly freeze.
- 21 m³/sJan
- 6.2 m³/sFeb
- 37 m³/sMar
- 146 m³/sApr
- 142 m³/sMay
- 100 m³/sJun
- 75 m³/sJul
- 61 m³/sAug
- 68 m³/sSep
- 84 m³/sOct
- 59 m³/sNov
- 56 m³/sDec
From about 6.2 m³/s in the lowest month to 146 m³/s in the highest. Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: from May to June and from September to October.
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 Quebec, Canada
Montmorency Falls is a waterfall in Canada. The water falls 85 m.
Getting there.
- Boischatelnearest town · 0.4 km in a straight line
- Parking 360 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
- Quebec Jean Lesage International Airport (YQB)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 22 km in a straight lineCar hire at YQB airport (Quebec)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- From May to June and from September to Octoberbest months to go (estimate)
Plan your visit
Stay, explore and get there
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.
28 MW
About 34 m³/s falling 85 m: the power of the water as it drops.
- as much as 9.5 large wind turbines
- enough to power about 7,100 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.
N
2 km
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 (EOX, CC BY 4.0), 8 × 8 km, north up. Points © OpenStreetMap contributors.
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.
Around the falls the river drops 113 m in 2.5 km. Here the river runs about 72 m below the lower rim of its valley.
What is around.
- 8viewpointsBelvédère de la Baronne and 7 more
- —waymarked walking routes
- 59car parks
- —swimming spots
- 27picnic sites
- 6toilets
- 4information boards and visitor centres
- 8bus stops within 1 km
- —other named waterfalls within 4 km
- 1caves
- 2campsitesCoop Camping Saint-Esprit, Centre de plein air de Beauport
- 18hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 kmHotel Ambassadeur Quebec, Gîte du Vieux-Bourg, Capitale Beauport and 15 more
- 9restaurants 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
- Boischatel0.4 km in a straight line
- Beauport4.9 km in a straight line
- L'Ange-Gardien5.9 km in a straight line
- La Cité-Limoilou9.1 km in a straight line
- Lévis10 km in a straight line
- Québec10 km in a straight line
- Château-Richer12 km in a straight line
- Charlesbourg12 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 | -7 | -6 | -1 | 8 | 17 | 22 | 24 | 23 | 19 | 11 | 4 | -4 |
| Night °C | -17 | -16 | -10 | -2 | 6 | 12 | 15 | 14 | 10 | 4 | -3 | -12 |
| Rain & snow (mm) | 66 | 64 | 72 | 93 | 95 | 113 | 123 | 108 | 109 | 119 | 90 | 94 |
| Wet days | 13 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 15 | 16 | 19 | 16 | 14 | 14 | 14 | 14 |
| Sun h/day | 3.5 | 4.8 | 5.8 | 6.3 | 6.8 | 7.1 | 7.1 | 6.5 | 5.6 | 3.4 | 2.3 | 2.2 |
| Snow on the ground (cm) | 38 | 49 | 49 | 18 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 6 | 16 | 25 |
Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (89 m) at −6.5 °C per 1,000 m. Not a forecast.
Photos
Through visitors' eyes.
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 | 126% | 99% | 179% | 88% | 69% | 77% | 108% | 125% | 109% | 134% | 90% | 140% |
| 2021 | 52% | 79% | 110% | 44% | 79% | 116% | 87% | 62% | 106% | 72% | 88% | 107% |
| 2022 | 63% | 168% | 140% | 118% | 145% | 106% | 123% | 135% | 60% | 70% | 115% | 144% |
| 2023 | 100% | 116% | 70% | 98% | 64% | 108% | 158% | 155% | 62% | 96% | 89% | 102% |
| 2024 | 106% | 57% | 85% | 71% | 100% | 132% | 91% | 120% | 55% | 52% | 91% | 106% |
| 2025 | 82% | 97% | 113% | 104% | 101% | 118% | 104% | 68% | 37% | 83% | 111% | 75% |
130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual
Compare with the waterfalls nearby.
About these numbers
| Names, height, width, river | Wikidata (Q1946396) · 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.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers, canyons, caves or dark skies?
Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.





