Water data sources in China

China Meteorological Administration's climate center providing precipitation, climate services, and water-related climate data

Free | China - National climate and hydrological monitoring

Official publications portal providing annual China Water Resources Bulletins since 1998, statistical reports on water activities, water use efficiency, flood control, and...

Free | National - all major river basins

National environmental monitoring agency providing monthly surface water quality bulletins from automatic monitoring stations across major rivers and lakes

Free | National - major river basins and lakes

China's national groundwater monitoring system operated by the China Geological Survey, providing groundwater level and quality data from over 20,000 monitoring wells across all...

Limited | National (20,000+ wells)

China's national real-time hydrological information system providing water level, discharge, and rainfall data from thousands of monitoring stations across major Chinese river...

Free | National

Hydrological and reservoir operations data from the Three Gorges Dam and associated cascade reservoirs on the Yangtze River, including water level, inflow, outflow, and power...

Limited | Three Gorges and Yangtze Cascade

National groundwater monitoring network

Free | 11,911 monitoring points, 4.3M records

Chinese water environment

Registration Required | 972 monitoring stations

China National Environmental Monitoring Centre (under the Ministry of Ecology and Environment) real-time surface water quality data, updated every 4 hours across 2,000+ stations...

Free | National (2,000+ stations)

Yellow River basin monitoring

Limited | Yellow River basin

Chinese Academy of Sciences CropWatch platform providing remote-sensing-based crop condition, agro-climatic indicators (including water-related stress/drought) and production...

Free | Global / China

Chinese national data center (Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources, CAS) providing glacier, frozen soil, desert and hydrology datasets, including runoff...

Free | China / Global

National data sharing platform organized by the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, CAS, with 115+ thematic databases (>2 PB) covering the...

Free | China / Global

China's largest scientific data center for the Tibetan Plateau and surrounding Asian water towers, hosting 2,400+ datasets including gridded runoff, streamflow records for Third...

Free | Tibetan Plateau / Pan-Third Pole

China's public open data repository (Chinese Academy of Sciences) hosting hydrology datasets such as the China Natural Runoff Dataset (CNRD v1.0), the Chinese Mainland River...

Free | China

Monthly naturalized runoff fields for China at 0.25-degree resolution from the 1990s to 2010s, generated with a calibrated land-surface hydrological model.

Free | National (China)

Academic project digitizing historical Chinese hydrology station records - daily discharge, total suspended sediment, rainfall and evaporation measured at Chinese gauging stations...

Free | China (historical)

Monthly data for 8 water quality parameters across 180,000 lakes and reservoirs in China, developed using random forest models. Published 2025.

Free | National