Voëlvlei Dam — current level 51% as of 11 May 2026
Voëlvlei Dam is up 1.1 pts on last week and down 7.3 pts on the same week last year . Voëlvlei is the second-biggest dam in the system, but unlike the others it isn't filled directly by its own catchment. Water has to be pumped over from the Berg River. That makes it slower to recover when the winter rains arrive.
A decade of late-autumn readings.
One bar per year, showing where Voëlvlei Dam sat the same week each May, at the end of the dry season. The 2017 and 2018 lows are the Day Zero drought. The bars climbing again from 2020 onwards are the wet winters that brought Cape Town's dams back.
Will the rain come?
Cape Town's reservoirs refill almost entirely between May and September. A dry winter is the single biggest predictor of next summer's restrictions. The 7-day forecast over the Voëlvlei catchment is below the long-term median.
Voëlvlei Dam is one of six.
Voëlvlei Dam is one of six dams that supply Cape Town. The combined level across all six is the figure the City and DWS actually plan against. Any single dam reading is only part of the story.