Lakes and standing inland waters

Menihek Lakes

Menihek Lakes (Innu: Minaiku) is a lake system in western Labrador on the upper Churchill River, site of the 18 MW Menihek hydroelectric station built in 1954 to power the Schefferville iron ore mines.

Milh

Lake Milh (بحيرة ملح), also called Lake Razzaza, is a large artificial saline lake in central Iraq created in 1969 to store Euphrates floodwaters via Habbaniya Lake; it has shrunk severely since the 1990s.

Mille Lacs (lake, Canada)

Lac des Mille Lacs, "Lake of a Thousand Lakes," is a 245.2 km² lake with 574 islands in Thunder Bay District, Ontario, Canada, headwater reservoir of the Seine River, distinct from Minnesota's Mille Lacs Lake.

Minnitaki

Minnitaki Lake is a large lake with numerous islands in Kenora District, Ontario, Canada, near Sioux Lookout, known for its walleye and lake trout fishery.

Minto

Minto: chiefly Lac Minto (Qasigialik), a large lake in Nord-du-Québec, Canada, named 1898 by Albert Peter Low for the 4th Earl of Minto; source of the Rivière aux Feuilles.

Mistassini

Mistassini (Cree "big rock") names Quebec's largest natural freshwater lake and the Cree community of Mistissini on its shore, about 600 km northwest of Quebec City; Cree presence over 5,000 years, fur trade from 1672, James Bay Agreement 1975.

Mono Lake

Mono Lake is a saline, alkaline endorheic lake in eastern California's Mono Basin, remnant of Pleistocene Lake Russell; saltier than the ocean (pH 10), with tufa towers, young volcanism, and post-1941 water diversions to Los Angeles.

Moore

Lake Moore is a large ephemeral salt lake in the Shire of Yalgoo, Western Australia, dominating the 24,269 km² Ninghan basin; a hyper-saline halite and gypsum flat with a mined gypsum deposit, proposed as a nature reserve in 2023.

Moosehead Lake

Moosehead Lake, Maine's largest lake (74,890 acres, 117 sq mi, 40 miles long, 246 feet deep), lies in the North Woods at the Kennebec River headwater near Greenville, famed for salmon, togue, and brook trout fishing, its 178-year ice-out record, and the steamboat Katahdin.

Moraine Lake

Moraine Lake, a turquoise glacial lake in Banff National Park's Valley of the Ten Peaks, Alberta, named by explorer Walter Wilcox in 1899; closed to personal vehicles since 2023, accessible only by reservation-only Parks Canada shuttle, commercial buses, or bike and foot.

Murray (lake)

Lake Murray is the name of several lakes, chiefly the largest lake in Papua New Guinea and a large hydroelectric reservoir on the Saluda River in South Carolina.

Mweru

Lake Mweru, a Zambia-DRC border lake in the Congo basin fed by the Luapula River; major inland fishery, endemic cichlid radiation, and the new Luapula River and Lake Mweru Authority. Distinct from Lake Mweru Wantipa.

Mývatn

Mývatn ("midge lake") is a 37 km² shallow, spring-fed, naturally eutrophic lake in northeastern Iceland, formed about 2,300 years ago, famous for chironomid midges, duck diversity, Ramsar protection, and pseudocraters.

Namtso

Namtso (纳木错, gnam mtsho, Tengri Nor), the "heavenly lake," is a ~2,000 km² saline closed-basin lake at ~4,718 m on the Tibetan Plateau, China's second-largest saltwater lake and a Tibetan Buddhist holy lake.

Naococane

Lac Naococane (Lake Naococane), a 398 km² lake in Eeyou Istchee Baie-James, Nord-du-Québec, Quebec; East Cree name origin, drains toward La Grande Rivière; officialized 5 December 1968.

Napaktulik

Napaktulik Lake, Nunavut, Canada (Inuinnaqtun, "the place where there are trees"), formerly Takijuq Lake; 1,080 km2, 381 m elevation, eighth-largest lake in Nunavut, mapped by Samuel Hearne in 1771.

Naurzum Lake System

Naurzum Lake System (Наурзум), Ramsar site no. 1872 in Kostanay Region, Kazakhstan: about 26 shallow steppe lakes of 139,714 ha within Naurzum State Nature Reserve, a Saryarka World Heritage component and key Siberian Crane stopover, designated 12 July 2009.

Neale

Lake Neale: intermittent salt lake (playa) in the Petermann locality, Northern Territory, Australia, northwest of Lake Amadeus; named 1930 for pilot Frank Neale; part of the Hopkins-to-Finke salt lake chain in the Amadeus Basin.

Nejanilini

Nejanilini Lake, a large lake in northern Manitoba, Canada, of Dene Suline (Chipewyan) name origin, official since 1944; area 263.346 km2, at tree line near the Manitoba-Nunavut border, namesake of a studied low-Arctic region.

Nettilling

Nettilling Lake, the largest lake in the Canadian Arctic Archipelago and largest lake on an island, on Baffin Island, Nunavut; about 5,542 km², drained by the Koukdjuak River to Foxe Basin.

Ngoring

Ngoring Lake (鄂陵湖, Tibetan Cuoelang, cyan lake) is the largest freshwater lake on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, in Madoi County, Qinghai, at the Yellow River source; sister lake of Gyaring, area about 610-651 km2, elevation about 4,269 m.

Niagara Scow

Niagara Scow, also called the Iron Scow or Old Scow: a steel dumping barge stranded in the upper Niagara River rapids since August 6, 1918, about 600 meters above Horseshoe Falls, site of a famous breeches-buoy rescue.

Nipigon

Lake Nipigon, northwestern Ontario's largest lake entirely within the province, drains via the Nipigon River into Lake Superior as its largest tributary; area 4,848 km2, record 1915 brook trout, Nipigon Bay AOC delisted 2026.

Nipissing

Nipissing (Lake Nipissing) is a large shallow lake in north-central Ontario draining via the dammed French River to Georgian Bay, home of Nipissing First Nation and a heavily managed walleye fishery.

Nonacho

Nonacho Lake, Northwest Territories, Canada: 784 km2 glacial scour lake, 8th largest in NWT, largest lake in the Taltson River basin, dam-regulated for Taltson hydroelectricity, with fly-in fishing from Yellowknife.

North Caribou

North Caribou (North Caribou Lake, Weagamow/Round Lake) is a large lake in Kenora District, northwestern Ontario, home to North Caribou Lake First Nation, an Oji-Cree community, and a remote fly-in fishing destination.

Northern Eastern Rift

Northern Eastern Rift (FEOW ecoregion 528, Afrotropic): freshwater ecoregion of the northern Ethiopian Rift Valley's endorheic lakes (Zwai, Abijata, Langano, Shala, Awassa), crater lakes, and the Awash River terminating in Lake Abhe, spanning Ethiopia, Djibouti, and Somalia.

Nueltin

Nueltin Lake, a 2,279 km2 glacial lake straddling the Manitoba-Nunavut border at 60.5N 99.5W, drained by the Thlewiaza River to Hudson Bay and protected by Nueltin Lake Provincial Park in Manitoba.

O'Higgins/San Martín

Lago O'Higgins/San Martín is a deep glacial lake in the Patagonian Andes, situated on the border of Chile and Argentina, and known for being the deepest in Chile.