Rhine · km 688.0
Cologne gauge — Rhine water levels
Free-flowing The river runs free here, so the level is the constraint: this is where a drought actually binds a hull.
The lower-Rhine bellwether and the gauge German news coverage quotes. More water here than upstream — generally the last stretch to become impassable and the first to recover.
Right now
Cologne Rhine
49 cm rising 4 centimetres over 72 hours rising 4 cm over 72 hours
low on mean low/high water (MNW/MHW) · normal on navigational reference levels (NSW/HSW) — the publisher's own classification of its own reading.
90 cm below the 139 cm published low-water reference. Published low-water reference for this stretch. The waterway authority's own published figure for this stretch, not Waterlogged's arithmetic and not a requirement set by any cruise line.
The waterway authority's own published figure for this stretch, not Waterlogged's arithmetic and not a requirement set by any cruise line. Reference basis on file: GlW referenced to 2002 (BfG 2026, Anlage A, Table A-1).
Official forecasts and notices for this gauge
Linking is not endorsement. The publisher controls its own page, its own values and its own terms.
The official forecast for this gauge
BfG's 14-day water-level forecast for Köln BfG issued this forecast: 2026-10-04 GMT+1
BfG's 14-day water-level forecast for Köln
Published by Bundesanstalt für Gewässerkunde (BfG). BfG issued this forecast: 2026-10-04 GMT+1.
| Day | Lower | Middle | Upper |
|---|---|---|---|
| Mon 5 Oct | 50 | 51 | 53 |
| Tue 6 Oct | 49 | 52 | 54 |
| Wed 7 Oct | 45 | 48 | 51 |
| Thu 8 Oct | 44 | 49 | 55 |
| Fri 9 Oct | 51 | 65 | 81 |
| Sat 10 Oct | 57 | 75 | 98 |
| Sun 11 Oct | 61 | 86 | 117 |
| Mon 12 Oct | 69 | 105 | 153 |
| Tue 13 Oct | 74 | 115 | 174 |
| Wed 14 Oct | 76 | 118 | 177 |
| Thu 15 Oct | 77 | 120 | 181 |
| Fri 16 Oct | 77 | 119 | 179 |
| Sat 17 Oct | 73 | 117 | 182 |
BfG publishes a low and a high figure for every day, not one certain number. Read the whole range.
The three columns are BfG's own 10th, 50th and 90th percentiles, in centimetres at the gauge. Nothing between them is filled in by us.
BfG does not publish values above 830 centimetres. Where a figure would be higher, their file says so and this table reads "above 830".
BfG's 6-week outlook for Köln BfG issued this forecast: 2026-10-01
BfG's 6-week outlook for Köln
Published by Bundesanstalt für Gewässerkunde (BfG). BfG issued this forecast: 2026-10-01.
Each line is one whole week, which is how BfG publishes this product. It gives no figure for any single day, and neither do we.
| Week | Lower | Middle | Upper |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1–7 October | 32 | 45 | 57 |
| 8–14 October | 35 | 69 | 104 |
| 15–21 October | 16 | 82 | 152 |
| 22–28 October | -6 | 87 | 189 |
| 29 Oct–4 Nov | -13 | 89 | 205 |
| 5–11 November | -17 | 98 | 238 |
The three columns are BfG's own 5th, 50th and 95th percentiles from their weather-driven runs, in centimetres at the gauge.
Forecast water levels are from BfG. Waterlogged only reports historical and current data.
Every figure above is a water level at the gauge, in centimetres. It is not the depth of water under a ship and it is not a ship's draft.
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Cologne's own forecast page — opens ELWIS (listed under Köln)
The gauge's own page: measured levels beside the German federal forecast for Cologne, in centimetres on the same gauge datum this site uses. The German spelling is Köln, so look under K, not C.
ELWIS content is OpenData and its terms permit links to its pages when the source and the address “www.elwis.de” are named. Waterlogged copies nothing from this page.
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Official German federal 14-day water-level forecast — opens BfG
The German federal hydrology institute's own daily water-level forecast, fourteen days ahead, with BfG's own spread and caveats. It covers seven Rhine gauges — Oestrich, Kaub, Koblenz, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Duisburg-Ruhrort and Emmerich — and no other river.
This product is CC BY 4.0. Waterlogged shows forecast values with the exact credit “Bundesanstalt für Gewässerkunde (BfG)” and names the forecast's own issue date and time from the CSV header. The value never feeds Waterlogged's scoring.
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Official German federal six-week outlook (weekly means) — opens BfG
BfG publishes this as a trend statement in weekly means, six weeks ahead, not as day-by-day cruise guidance. It reaches Maxau, Kaub and Cologne on the Rhine, Pfelling and Hofkirchen on the Danube, and Dresden on the Elbe. Open the official product to read BfG's own figures and caveats.
This product is CC BY 4.0. Waterlogged may show the weekly means with the exact credit “Bundesanstalt für Gewässerkunde (BfG)” and the forecast's own issue date and time from the CSV header. We do not turn weekly means into per-day levels or passenger chances.
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PEGELONLINE — German federal waterways gauge service
The publisher of every German centimetre on this site, with its own station pages and its own classification of each reading.
History on this date
The five lowest years in this archive around this calendar date
Archive span: 2015 to 2023, in this archive · 5 eligible years.
| Year | Lowest in the window | On | Level at the end of the window | Measured 72-hour change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 (this year) | 40 cm | — | 50 cm | 4 cm |
| 2018 | 77 cm | 2018-10-19 | 77 cm | -10 cm |
| 2020 | 120 cm | 2020-09-24 | 219 cm | -22 cm |
| 2016 | 121 cm | 2016-10-18 | 122 cm | 0 cm |
| 2023 | 122 cm | 2023-10-19 | 122 cm | -2 cm |
| 2015 | 132 cm | 2015-10-04 | 152 cm | 11 cm |
The window is the 14 days either side of today's calendar date. Years are ranked by their lowest measured daily mean inside it.
Measured PEGELONLINE/WSV stage data, licensed under Datenlizenz Deutschland – Zero – Version 2.0 (DL-DE/Zero-2.0).
- Measured daily means only; missing dates are omitted and gaps are never interpolated.
- This panel describes historical measurements and fitted seasonality, not a forecast.
- The day-of-year median is the fitted PEGELONLINE climatology in drift_params.json; it is not a projected level.
- Today's daily mean may represent a partial local civil day.
This is measured history, not a forecast and not an estimate of disruption probability.
Rain in the next 14 days
Rhine above Kaub — representative catchment precipitation.
3 days: 1.6 mm · 7 days: 50.6 mm · 14 days: 50.6 mm — forecast precipitation.
Rain forecast by Open-Meteo (commercial licence), model icon_seamless · fetched 5 October 2026 at 00:39 UTC · covering 14 days, 5 October to 18 October.
Weather data by Open-Meteo (commercial licence) · Representative catchment precipitation total from 8 weighted sampling points; a point sample, not an areal mean.
Rain may slow a fall or create a rise after losses and routing. Waterlogged does not convert this forecast into gauge centimetres or a cruise-disruption probability.
Read a rain forecast at the source
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Deutscher Wetterdienst — official German weather forecasts
Germany's national weather service forecast for the Rhine, Main, Moselle and Danube catchments.
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yr.no — free European rain forecasts (MET Norway / NRK)
A free public forecast covering the same catchments, if you want rain amounts today.
How rain becomes river level
What the measurements show
After rain ends, elevated levels at this gauge decay with a ~58-day summer half-life.
How quickly a departure from normal has faded, historically
- In the fitted winter runoff block, an elevated stage anomaly loses half of its remaining magnitude in about 31.0731 days as it relaxes toward the seasonal median.
- In the fitted summer recession block, an elevated stage anomaly loses half of its remaining magnitude in about 58.0414 days as it relaxes toward the seasonal median.
These are level-anomaly persistence figures fitted on measured stage — how long a departure from the seasonal middle has taken to halve. They are not rain-response coefficients and they do not convert rain into centimetres.
The block names are labels on a fitted split of the calendar, not seasons. The later block extends through the end of the year, so do not read its figure as a description of December.
Educational fitted-parameter explanation only; not a forecast or climate projection.
Source, licence and limits
- Source: PEGELONLINE (WSV) — terms of use.
- Measurement time: every reading on this page shows the time it was taken, and a stale reading is flagged rather than reused.
- Transformation: the level is the publisher's. The gap, where one is shown, is Waterlogged's arithmetic and is labelled as such.
- Reference-data note: approx — verify vs CCNR 2022-II-19 / KWD 2020
- Not for navigation. Nothing on this page should be used to plan the movement of a vessel.
Controlling gauge for the Lower Rhine (Emmerich–Cologne) leg that Amsterdam departures sail on day one.
Spotted something wrong? How to report a correction · the full source matrix · this gauge in the threshold diary.
Where this gauge fits
The Cologne gauge is one of the Rhine gauges we read. To see it next to the others, with the same reading and the same 72-hour move for each, read today's Rhine water levels.
Worried about a booking rather than a number? Will my river cruise be cancelled because of low water? sets out what a low reading does and does not mean, and only the cruise line decides. To put these gauges against one particular sailing — your ports, in order, on your dates — start from the front page.