New Zealand 
In numbers.
39m
Height
Apr
Oct–Dec
Best months
1,235m
Elevation
The water at Waitonga Falls, month by month
It roars from May to October.
The fullest months: from May to October.
- 52%Jan
- 46%Feb
- 43%Mar
- 62%Apr
- 79%May
- 100%Jun
- 97%Jul
- 95%Aug
- 92%Sep
- 87%Oct
- 68%Nov
- 68%Dec
Best months to go, with plenty of water and pleasant days: April and from October to December.
Estimate from rain, snowmelt and evaporation month by month (NASA POWER, 1991–2020) around the falls. Dams upstream can change the real flow.
Waterfall in New Zealand
Waitonga Falls is a waterfall in New Zealand. The water falls 39 m. It lies within Tongariro National Park. It is part of a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Getting there.
- Ohakunenearest town · 13 km in a straight line
- Parking 1,250 m awaynearest car park in OpenStreetMap, straight line
- Wanganui Airport (WAG)nearest airport with scheduled flights · 82 km in a straight lineCar hire at PMR airport (Palmerston North)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- April and from October to Decemberbest 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.
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 165 m in 1.7 km. Here the river runs about 80 m below the lower rim of its valley.
What is around.
- 3viewpoints
- 2waymarked walking routesRound The Mountain Track, Round the Mountain - 04 Mangaehuehu Hut to Ohakune Mountain Road
- 2car parks
- —swimming spots
- —picnic sites
- —toilets
- 1information boards and visitor centres
- —bus stops within 1 km
- 2other named waterfalls within 4 kmMangawhero Falls, Sigley Falls
- —caves
- —campsites
- —hotels, B&Bs and huts within 6 km
- 2restaurants 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
- Ohakune13 km in a straight line
- Raetihi23 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 | 17 | 18 | 15 | 11 | 8 | 5 | 4 | 5 | 7 | 9 | 12 | 14 |
| Night °C | 6 | 6 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 0 | -2 | -1 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 5 |
| Rain & snow (mm) | 64 | 63 | 60 | 81 | 88 | 103 | 90 | 88 | 89 | 89 | 70 | 89 |
| Wet days | 12 | 9 | 11 | 13 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 18 | 16 | 16 | 14 | 14 |
| Sun h/day | 8.8 | 7.9 | 7.0 | 5.7 | 4.4 | 3.6 | 4.0 | 4.7 | 5.4 | 6.1 | 7.3 | 7.3 |
| Snow on the ground (cm) | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Long-term averages 1991–2020 (NASA POWER) for a cell about 55 km wide, with temperatures carried to the height of the falls (1,235 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 | 41% | 32% | 82% | 38% | 75% | 117% | 86% | 59% | 93% | 91% | 224% | 59% |
| 2021 | 86% | 50% | 141% | 47% | 65% | 106% | 72% | 97% | 134% | 97% | 102% | 184% |
| 2022 | 20% | 334% | 196% | 30% | 110% | 116% | 172% | 115% | 147% | 109% | 218% | 133% |
| 2023 | 286% | 311% | 116% | 74% | 139% | 85% | 81% | 71% | 121% | 63% | 138% | 110% |
| 2024 | 129% | 54% | 69% | 64% | 91% | 97% | 86% | 107% | 88% | 88% | 67% | 84% |
| 2025 | 73% | 25% | 105% | 77% | 92% | 96% | 147% | 60% | 76% | 132% | 94% | 133% |
130% wetter than usual 70% drier than usual
Compare with the waterfalls nearby.
Waitonga Falls
New Zealand
- 39 mHeight
- —Average flow
- Apr, Oct–DecBest months
About these numbers
| Names, height, width, river | Wikidata (Q34682345) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| 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
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