41 graded lakes within 4 hr of downtown
Driving from Raleigh to a lake worth swimming in
Lake Raleigh is the closest graded water to Raleigh, 11 min away, and it grades D. Old Town Reservoir grades B and takes 1 hr 26 min — 1 hr 15 min more in the car, each way, for water that clears the bar.
Every lake below is ranked by how long the drive is, and labelled with the water-quality letter it earned. Closest is not the same as cleanest, and this page will not pretend otherwise.
Closer, or cleaner — the whole ladder
41 lakes, sorted by drive time from downtown Raleigh. Letters in range: 1 A, 3 B, 5 C, 11 D, 21 F. The furthest entry is Rockingham City Lake at 2 hr 5 min.
| Drive | Lake | Grade | Road miles | County | Size | Access |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 11 min | Lake Raleigh | D | 3.9 | Wake County, NC | 88 ac | Not recorded |
| 12 min | Lake Johnson | D | 5.2 | Wake County, NC | 148 ac | Not recorded |
| 18 min | Lake Benson | F | 8.6 | Wake County, NC | 463 ac | Not recorded |
| 21 min | Lake Wheeler | F | 9.2 | Wake County, NC | 560 ac | Not recorded |
| 21 min | Apex Reservoir | F | 12.2 | Wake County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 24 min | Reedy Creek Lake | F | 10.2 | Wake County, NC | 8 ac | Not recorded |
| 25 min | Lake Crabtree | F | 13.6 | Wake County, NC | 473 ac | Not recorded |
| 28 min | Sunset Lake | F | 17.2 | Wake County, NC | 98 ac | Not recorded |
| 30 min | Big Lake | F | 12.7 | Wake County, NC | 25 ac | Not recorded |
| 30 min | Falls of the Neuse Reservoir | F | 18 | Wake County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 32 min | Sycamore Lake | F | 14.3 | Wake County, NC | 55 ac | Not recorded |
| 32 min | Bass Lake | F | 17.9 | Wake County, NC | 59 ac | Not recorded |
| 37 min | Beaverdam Lake | F | 23 | Wake County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 38 min | B E Jordan Lake | F | 24.8 | Chatham County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 43 min | Jordan Lake | F | 25.1 | Chatham County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 43 min | Harris Lake | F | 25.5 | Wake County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 44 min | Lake Rogers | F | 26.4 | Granville County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 46 min | Buckhorn Dam Lake | F | 33.5 | Chatham County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 48 min | University Lake | F | 31.2 | Orange County, NC | 213 ac | Not recorded |
| 49 min | B Everett Jordan Lake | D | 28 | Chatham County, NC | 13,940 ac | ✓ Public |
| 51 min | Robeson Creek Lake | F | 31 | Chatham County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 53 min | Corporation Lake | C | 41 | Orange County, NC | 5 ac | Not recorded |
| 54 min | Lake Ben Johnson | C | 39 | Orange County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 55 min | Lake Butner | D | 31.9 | Granville County, NC | 340 ac | Not recorded |
| 57 min | Little River Reservoir | F | 35.8 | Durham County, NC | 550 ac | Not recorded |
| 57 min | Wiggins Mill Reservoir | D | 47.1 | Wilson County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 1 min | Lake Michie | F | 38.6 | Durham County, NC | 460 ac | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 1 min | Cane Creek Reservoir | D | 41.3 | Orange County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 1 min | Toisnot Reservoir | D | 47.1 | Wilson County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 4 min | West Fork Eno River Reservoir | D | 47.2 | Orange County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 5 min | Lake Devin | D | 40.2 | Granville County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 1 hr 10 min | Tar River Reservoir | F | 53.5 | Nash County, NC | 1,000 ac | ✓ Public |
| 1 hr 16 min | Carthage City Lake | C | 58.2 | Moore County, NC | 9 ac | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 26 min | Lake Burlington | D | 62.7 | Alamance County, NC | 757 ac | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 26 min | Old Town Reservoir | B | 66.6 | Moore County, NC | 61 ac | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 28 min | Hope Mills Lake | B | 69.2 | Cumberland County, NC | 68 ac | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 30 min | John H Kerr Reservoir | C | 57.3 | Vance County, NC | Not recorded | ✓ Public |
| 1 hr 30 min | Lake Isaac Walton | D | 58.3 | Person County, NC | 224 ac | Not recorded |
| 1 hr 31 min | Cliffs of the Neuse Lake | C | 67.2 | Wayne County, NC | 9 ac | ✓ Public |
| 1 hr 31 min | Pages Lake | B | 71.4 | Moore County, NC | 34 ac | Not recorded |
| 2 hr 5 min | Rockingham City Lake | A | 98.1 | Richmond County, NC | Not recorded | Not recorded |
What the numbers are, and are not
Drive times and road miles are one-way road routing from downtown Raleigh to the nearest public road at each lake, over the OpenStreetMap network via OSRM (router.project-osrm.org) over OpenStreetMap, driving profile, free-flow. Free-flow means no traffic model and no time of day, so a weekend morning will beat these numbers and a Friday afternoon will not.
The letter is the lake’s A–F water-quality grade: clarity, total phosphorus and chlorophyll-a measured over years, not a rating of the beach, the boat ramp or the view. An A describes the lake’s record; it does not clear the water for a particular afternoon. Lakes with no letter are not listed here, because the letter is the only axis this page ranks on.
Size and access come from the lake record where the agency published them. “Not recorded” means nobody documented it — it is a gap in the paperwork, not a statement about the lake.
More lakes near Raleigh
Nearby cities
Common questions
Frequently Asked Questions
Old Town Reservoir in Moore County, North Carolina. It grades B and the drive is 1 hr 26 min, or 66.6 road miles. The closest graded lake of any kind is Lake Raleigh at 11 min, and it grades D.
1 hr 15 min each way. Lake Raleigh is 11 min out and grades D; Old Town Reservoir is 1 hr 26 min out and grades B.
12 of the 41 lakes here have a public access point on the record, and the closest is Falls of the Neuse Reservoir, 30 min away, grading F. The rest of the table shows "Not recorded" where no access point was documented, which is not the same as no access — check with the managing agency before you trailer a boat.
By road, from downtown Raleigh to the nearest public road at each lake, over the OpenStreetMap road network. They are free-flow times: no traffic, no time of day, no stops. Treat them as the floor, and add for rush hour and for the last stretch to the water.
No. The letter summarises years of phosphorus, nitrogen, algae and turbidity measurements — it describes the lake, not this afternoon. A beach closure, a bloom, or a heavy rain can change conditions on an A lake overnight. Check the lake's own page for its measurement record, and check the managing agency for current advisories before you get in.
Stay by the water, not by the highway
Cabins, hotels and rentals around Old Town Reservoir in Moore County — the closest lake to Raleigh that grades B. 1 hr 26 min from downtown.
Top-rated places to stay near Old Town Reservoir
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