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Photo by Pudelek (Marcin Szala), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
Best time to visit Lake Balaton
Hungary · Europe
All twelve months scored on daily temperature, rainfall, humidity and holiday crowding.
The year in Lake Balaton
Tap a month for its page
- JanJLake Balaton in January: avoid
- FebFLake Balaton in February: ok
- MarMLake Balaton in March: good
- AprALake Balaton in April: sweet spot
- MayMLake Balaton in May: sweet spot
- JunJLake Balaton in June: sweet spot, busy
- JulJLake Balaton in July: sweet spot, busy
- AugALake Balaton in August: sweet spot, busy
- SepSLake Balaton in September: sweet spot
- OctOLake Balaton in October: sweet spot
- NovNLake Balaton in November: ok
- DecDLake Balaton in December: avoid
- Sweet spot
- Good
- OK
- Avoid
- Busy
Plan this trip
Each site opens on its own search: choose your dates there. A few open on their home page, where you type the place too.
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Flights from
Flights
Your city is a guess from your time zone. Choose your city
Where are you flying from? Choose your city for its flights.
Book with the airline
Where to stay
Book direct
Luxury
Things to do
Car hire
Rent direct
Travel insurance
Check whether your bank card or home insurance already covers this trip.
If the trip needs a visa, the travel agent or visa centre usually sells the cover it asks for.
Mobile data (eSIM)
Your own plan's EU roaming may already cover this.
Renting a pocket Wi-Fi is the other common way to stay connected.
These are sites people in book with. Each opens in a new tab, on the site's own pages.
Things to do in Lake Balaton
- Tihany Nice peninsula with an inner lake and church visible from most of the lake
- Badacsony Most famous winehill for its wine, on the northern coast
- Szigliget With the ruins of a Castle on the hilltop
- Balaton Uplands National Park North of Lake Balaton
- Balatonszárszó Popular, family-friendly tourist destination on the south shore of Lake Balaton
Tours and tickets in Lake Balaton
Each site opens on its own search: choose your dates there. A few open on their home page, where you type the place too. Links marked Ad pay us a commission if you book, at no extra cost to you; most pay nothing, and what a site pays never decides whether it is listed or where. How we rank
Sights and their lines from Wikivoyage (Lake Balaton), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; in order of how often each one's Wikipedia article was read on phones in the last 12 months.
Month by month
| Month | Max °C | Rain days | Humidity | Sun h/day | Verdict | Why |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan | 5° | 6d | 82% | 4.9h | avoid | bitter cold: 5C daily max |
| Feb | 8° | 6d | 77% | 6.5h | ok | 8C max, 6 rainy days |
| Mar | 12° | 6d | 69% | 8.3h | good | 12C max, 6 rainy days |
| Apr | 17° | 5d | 64% | 10.0h | sweet spot | 17C max, 5 rainy days |
| May | 21° | 8d | 68% | 10.7h | sweet spot | 21C max, 8 rainy days |
| Jun | 26° | 5d | 67% | 12.9h | sweet spot busy | busier than usual |
| Jul | 28° | 4d | 64% | 12.8h | sweet spot busy | busier than usual |
| Aug | 28° | 4d | 66% | 12.1h | sweet spot busy | busier than usual |
| Sep | 23° | 6d | 71% | 9.5h | sweet spot | 23C max, 6 rainy days |
| Oct | 17° | 5d | 77% | 7.8h | sweet spot | 17C max, 5 rainy days |
| Nov | 10° | 8d | 85% | 5.1h | ok | 10C max, 8 rainy days |
| Dec | 6° | 8d | 86% | 4.0h | avoid | bitter cold: 6C daily max |
Rain days are the days with at least 1 mm of rain, as a weather station counts them.
Weather read at Balatonfüred, on the north shore: ten years of ERA5 and ERA5-Land reanalysis, through Open-Meteo's open data.
A busy month is a crowded one, not a bad one — usually it is crowded because the weather is good. It is flagged rather than scored down, and crowds alone never make a month “avoid”: that is reserved for weather worth skipping.
How busy it gets
Then and now
Lake Balaton's February days now average 8.1°C, 4.6°C warmer than in 1981–1990. 10 of 12 months are clearly warmer.
| Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1981–90 | 1.8° | 3.5° | 8.9° | 15.0° | 20.4° | 22.9° | 26.0° | 25.3° | 21.5° | 15.5° | 7.6° | 4.0° |
| 2017–26 | 4.5° | 8.1° | 12.5° | 16.8° | 20.8° | 26.4° | 27.7° | 28.2° | 22.7° | 17.4° | 10.2° | 5.9° |
| Change | +2.7° | +4.6° | +3.5° | +1.9° | +0.4° | +3.4° | +1.7° | +2.8° | +1.2° | +1.8° | +2.6° | +2.0° |
The average daily high, month by month, for the nearest ERA5 grid cell. Bold is a clear change; grey is within the ordinary spread between years. Every destination, ranked.
Getting there
Fly into Budapest (BUD), then drive. The flights under Where to book are to Budapest.
The drive from each airport is the road's, from openrouteservice.org by HeiGIT: typical, not a schedule.
How far Lake Balaton is depends on where you set off from — the months above do not.
Open in Rome2rio for every way from to Lake Balaton, flying or not.
Before you go
Type C and F plugs at 230 V. Drives on the right. The currency is the Forint. No UK Foreign Office advice against travel. Global Affairs Canada: Exercise normal security precautions. US State Department: Level 1: Exercise Normal Precautions. Everything for Hungary: cost of living, languages, emergency numbers and health.
Being there
On arrival
- Paying — Almost all businesses visitors use in Budapest take cards, but small places may not; carry some forints, and pay in forints rather than euros.
- UPI, for visitors from India — Not accepted for paying here; bring a card that works abroad.
- Tipping — About 10% in restaurants, bars and taxis, unless the bill already has a 10% service charge (szervizdíj); then no tip is expected.
Getting around Lake Balaton
- Apps — Rides: Bolt, Uber. Maps: Google Maps, Apple Maps. Messages: Messenger. Uber returned to Hungary in 2024 and books rides at taxi fares only.
Help
- Emergency — 112 (any emergency).
TravelCharika is not an emergency service: we cannot call for help or send anyone. Numbers can change; if one fails, ask someone local or your hotel.
- Hospitals near Lake Balatona search on Google Maps
- Pharmacies near Lake Balatona search on Google Maps
Your embassy — : how to reach your embassy or consulate abroad. A guess from your city, : a city is not a passport.
Put together by hand from the sources listed, checked 3 October 2026. Apps, cards and rules change, so check before you rely on one.
Sources (13)
- gov.uk/foreign-travel-advice/hungary/getting-help
- en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Budapest
- en.wikivoyage.org/wiki/Hungary
- bolt.eu/en/cities/budapest
- uber.com/global/en/cities/budapest
- uber.com/hu/en/ride
- hu.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uber
- linkmobility.com/blog/the-most-popular-messaging-apps-across-the-globe
- ooma.com/blog/the-most-popular-messaging-apps-by-country
- developers.google.com/maps/coverage
- apple.com/ios/feature-availability
- pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2286608
- rbidocs.rbi.org.in/rdocs/AnnualReport/PDFs/09PAYMENT290526C6588B796E664822A2BD0DEB6452CAD4.PDF
Lake Balaton in pictures
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Chmee2 or Valtameri, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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Paulo Ferreira pauloferreira, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
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Oliv0, Élisabeth Clary, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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Oliv0, Élisabeth Clary, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
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GiveMeMollusks, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons
What Lake Balaton is like
Balaton (Plattensee in German) is the biggest lake by surface area in Central Europe and gives its name to this entire Hungarian Lake Balaton region. More on Wikivoyage
- Worth seeing
- Badacsony: the most well-known, most popular hill of the region. On this truncated cone of volcanic origin. More on Wikivoyage
- Worth doing
- Beautiful national parks, protected quarters, they demonstrated the old times, reservatums, theatres, aquaparks, sea baths, sport opportunities on earth, water and air, concerts and beautiful museums await every visitor. More on Wikivoyage
- Getting in
- Hévíz–Balaton Airport (SOB IATA), Repülőtér 1, Sármellék (South-west end of the lake is about 20 minutes' drive from Keszthely.) More on Wikivoyage
From the Wikivoyage article on Lake Balaton, written by travellers and licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; the full article has far more. The numbers above are measured; this is experience.
Around Lake Balaton
Also in Hungary
Nearby
Kind of place
Lake Balaton is in Hungary, Europe. Distances are great-circle, so a short one can still be a long way round.
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