River
River Somme
245 km from source to mouth · France.
FranceFlows into Baie de Somme
In numbers
Length
245km
Average flow
35m³/s
Basin
6,550km²
Drop
74m
from 74 m to 0 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
245 km of river and 67 stops on the way: 58 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmFonsommeat 74 m
- 0 kmRemaucourt265 people
- 0 kmFonsomme518 people
- 0 kmEssigny-le-Petit345 people
- 0 kmLesdins790 people
- 2 kmMorcourt544 people
- 5 kmRouvroy506 people
- 8 kmPont d'Isle, Saint-Quentin
- 9 kmSaint-Quentin52,813 people
- 10 kmGauchy5,183 people
- 14 kmGrugies1,280 people
- 14 kmDallon424 people
- 17 kmCastres246 people
- 18 kmFontaine-lès-Clercs232 people
- 19 kmContescourt61 people
- 21 kmSeraucourt-le-Grand706 people
- 23 kmHappencourt179 people
- 24 kmArtemps361 people
- 28 kmTugny-et-Pont282 people
- 28 kmSaint-Simon593 people
- 32 kmDury191 people
- 33 kmSommette-Eaucourt178 people
- 35 kmPithon78 people
- 38 kmHam4,378 people
- 40 kmEppeville1,704 people
- 43 kmSancourt269 people
- 45 kmOffoy196 people
- 48 kmVoyennes595 people
- 52 kmBéthencourt-sur-Somme124 people
- 53 kmVillecourt46 people
- 56 kmPargny198 people
- 56 kmFalvy163 people
- 59 kmÉpénancourt129 people
- 61 kmCizancourt30 people
- 63 kmSaint-Christ-Briost425 people
- 64 kmOmignontributary
- 66 kmBrie350 people
- 66 kmVillers-Carbonnel294 people
- 68 kmÉterpigny166 people
- 72 kmDoingt1,389 people
- 73 kmPéronne7,090 people
- 73 kmColognetributary
- 75 kmBiaches386 people
- 80 kmCléry-sur-Somme516 people
- 84 kmFeuillères155 people
- 84 kmSomme Viaduct
- 85 kmHem-Monacu137 people
- 88 kmCurlu152 people
- 92 kmÉclusier-Vaux85 people
- 93 kmFrise176 people
- 98 kmSuzanne190 people
- 101 kmCappy546 people
- 104 kmBray-sur-Somme1,184 people
- 105 kmLa Neuville-lès-Bray263 people
- 132 kmCorbie6,486 people
- 140 kmAncretributary
- 149 kmJules Verne Viaduct
- 151 kmLongueau5,180 people
- 152 kmAvretributary
- 153 kmCamon4,359 people
- 155 kmRivery3,454 people
- 158 kmAmiens136,449 people
- 160 kmSelletributary
- 170 kmAilly-sur-Somme3,360 people
- 188 kmNièvretributary
- 189 kmFlixecourt3,104 people
- 218 kmAbbeville26,461 people
- 243 kmLe Hourdel102 people
- 245 kmBaie de Sommeat 0 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in Picardy, France
At the mouth it carries 35 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 71 seconds. It drops from 74 m to 0 m, 0.3 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 6,550 km², about the size of PS. 638,000 people live in it. Highest water: from November to January. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- AmiensLargest city on its banks · 136,449 people
- Beauvais-Tillé airport (BVA)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 50 km from the cityCar hire at BVA airport (Beauvais)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- On the water22 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
- Kayak and canoe2 put-ins and rapids mapped (OpenStreetMap)
- From May to SeptemberThe best months to visit
River Somme, month by month
Highest water: from November to January
Best months to visit: from May to September.
From about 30 m³/s in the lowest month to 150 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.
Plan the trip
Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car
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.
The basin
River Somme: the basin in numbers
6,194 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 638,000people live in the basin
- 103/km²people per km²
- 97maverage altitude of the basin
- 659mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 10.0°Caverage air temperature
- 0.2%covered by lakes
What covers the basin
- 69% Cropland
- 9% Pasture
- 3% Towns and cities
RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.
Along the river
River Somme: what you find on the way
- 14WeirsBarrage de Long Supérieur, Barrage Inférieur and 12 more
- 129LocksCanal de Saint-Quentin, La Somme Canalisée, Canal du Nord and 126 more
- 1Waterfalls
- 2Canoe put-ins
- 11Boat ramps
- 5MarinasHalte nautique de Cappy, Corbie Mooring, Port à Fumier and 2 more
- 1River beachesPlage d'Isle
From OpenStreetMap, within 1.7 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
River Somme in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
1beach at the mouth or on the banksCoastya
Beaches (1)
At the mouth (25 km) and on the banks, by Coastya
- Plage de Fort-Mahon17 km away18.1°C
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit


Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.
Photos
River Somme in pictures




Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (18)
Also: Avre, Ancre, Nièvre, Selle, Hallue, Omignon, Cologne, Dien, Scardon, Airaines, Allemagne, Amboise, Germaine, Saint-Landon, Sommette, Tortille, Trie, Beine
Nearby
Rivers nearby
Where these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q37646) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed along the river network from the point given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Coastya — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
Do you prefer beaches, lakes, mountains, waterfalls, islands, rivers or canyons?
Same idea, other landscapes: field atlases built on open data, month by month, in seven languages.