Lake Travis

Is Lake Travis in a drought?

No — Lake Travis is full

Updated

681.4ft above sea level

Higher than 90% of months since 1942

614640 drought681 full620660Today

The 640 ft drought line is a reservoir level, not an official U.S. Drought Monitor category or LCRA drought stage. See key levels

  • How to read this gauge
    Water is drawn to the live reading; the hatched stretch is shoreline that would be underwater at full pool. The solid line is full pool; dashed lines mark the drought line and the record low.
Percent full
100%of conservation storage
Stored
1.1M acre-ftin storage
7-day change
+4.3 ftsince Nov 5
30-day change
+3.6 ftsince Oct 13
Live dashboardDam releases: 2,456 cfs daily avg

Every drought since 1942

Since Mansfield Dam closed in 1942, Lake Travis has sunk below 640 ft for four months or longer 7 separate times. The line is LCRA’s published monthly minimum: how low each month got, without the day-to-day wiggle.

Record low
614.2 ftAugust 1951, the lowest level since records began in 1942

Past 10 years

1low stand

Under 640 ft for 4+ months each

  • Lowest level each month
  • Below 640 ft for 4+ months
  • Full pool 681 ft
  • Drought line 640 ft

Drag across the chart, or use the arrow keys, to read a month

Lake Travis has spent four months or more below the drought line seven times since 1942.

Seven low stands

Today’s level is above the low of all seven past droughts.

  1. Today

    Live reading

    681.4 ft+0.4 ft

Each bar is how far below full pool (681 ft) the lake fell, on one 0–71 ft scale: longer means lower. The tick is the drought line, 41 ft down.

  • How stands are countedAnd the latest one

    A low stand is four or more months with the monthly minimum under 640 ft. A rebound of a month or two stays inside the same stand. Each bar measures how far below full pool the stand’s lowest month fell: the longer the bar, the deeper the drought.

    The deepest was 1950–52. The longest ran 3 years 11 mo, 2011–15.

    The latest, December 2022 – July 2025, bottomed at 626.9 ft in October 2023 before the lake climbed back. That end date is a reading of monthly values, not an official drought-end declaration.

Three levels worth knowing

Every number on this page is feet above mean sea level at Mansfield Dam. Read them against these three lines, top to bottom.

681 ft

Full pool

The top of the conservation pool, and what “100% full” means. Above it the lake is holding floodwater and Mansfield Dam’s gates can open. Full is about 1.13 million acre-feet. The highest level on record, 710.4 ft, came in December 1991.

650 ft

Low water

Most public boat ramps get difficult below this. The boating guide checks every ramp against the live level.

640 ft

Drought line

The line this site uses for drought. Every low stand on this page is a stretch of four or more months under it.

Drought questions

Short answers, straight from LCRA’s records. Official restrictions and drought stages come from LCRA and your water utility.

  • Is Lake Travis in a drought right now?

    This site marks Lake Travis “below drought line” when the reservoir sits under 640 ft above mean sea level, 41 ft under the 681 ft full pool. The answer at the top of this page updates from LCRA Hydromet about every 30 minutes.

  • What is the lowest Lake Travis has ever been?

    614.2 ft in August 1951 — 66.8 ft below full pool. That record, set during the 1950s drought of record, still stands.

  • What was the longest Lake Travis drought?

    July 2011 – May 2015: 3 years 11 mo with the monthly minimum under 640 ft, bottoming at 618.6 ft in September 2013.

  • When was Lake Travis last below the drought line?

    The most recent low stand ran December 2022 – July 2025 and reached 626.9 ft in October 2023. Since 1942 the lake has spent 7 multi-month stretches below 640 ft.

  • What level is Lake Travis considered full?

    681 ft above mean sea level, the top of the conservation pool. Above that the lake is holding floodwater and Mansfield Dam’s gates can open; the record high is 710.4 ft in December 1991. Most public boat ramps get difficult below about 650 ft.

  • What does “percent full” mean?

    Stored water as a share of roughly 1.1 million acre-feet of conservation capacity. It measures volume, not height: the lake is widest near the top, so each foot just under full pool holds far more water than a foot near the bottom, and percent full falls faster than the level does at first.

  • Why does Lake Travis drop so much?

    Travis is a water-supply reservoir, not a constant-level lake. It falls when evaporation, city and farm use, environmental flows and dam releases outrun inflow from the Colorado River and the upstream Highland Lakes. A dry Hill Country summer can take inches a week; one well-placed flood can put back tens of feet in days.

  • Who decides drought restrictions?

    The Lower Colorado River Authority operates Mansfield Dam and sets official drought stages under its Water Management Plan, using combined Buchanan and Travis storage. Watering rules come from your city or water utility. This site reports the numbers; it does not set restrictions.

Where the numbers come from