The 594 foot upper step of the Merced staircase above Vernal Fall, at its loudest in late May and June and visible from Glacier Point when the road is open.
May through mid July
Big water window
in a typical year
Snowmelt
What drives it
Merced River
Live USGS
Data on this page
gauge 11264500
NPS Yosemite
Managed by
their rules govern
Trail status, closures and safety rules belong to each falls' managing agency, named and linked on every page.
The season
What fills Nevada Fall, and when
Nevada Fall is the higher, bigger sibling on the same Merced River staircase as Vernal, and it keeps the same books: flowing all year on the strength of the upper Merced basin, peaking in late May or June per the Park Service, and thinning steadily through late summer as the high country runs out of snow.
Typical best flow: May through mid July
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What the agency itself says
Flows: all year, with peak flow in late May or June. You can see Nevada Fall (from a distance) from Glacier Point.
Yosemite National Park (National Park Service)What a snowmelt year looks like at full send: Palouse Falls in mid April, when the Palouse River is still carrying the melt. The same falls in late August is a ribbon. Timing is most of the visit. “04-15-14-palouse” — Dsdugan — CC0
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Right now
What Merced River is doing today
Flow at the gauge now
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USGS median for Oct 15
Not published
Gauge: USGS 11264500 Merced R a Happy Isles Bridge nr Yosemite CA, downstream, on the Merced just below the Vernal and Nevada staircase. The gauge reads the river, not the brink of the falls, so treat it as the trend line rather than a turnstile.
Source: USGS Water Services (National Water Information System). Instantaneous values and daily statistics services. U.S. Geological Survey data are works of the United States Government and are in the public domain. Gauge verified 2026-08-27.
The other half of the story: the same Palouse Falls in late August. Nothing is wrong; this is what a snowmelt river does every year once the melt is spent. “Palouse Falls 20100829” by Mark Wagner, CC BY-SA 2.5
Getting there
Access, in the agency's words and ours
Reached on foot beyond Vernal Fall via the steep Mist Trail and John Muir Trail loop. The distant road view is from Glacier Point, whose road the Park Service opens approximately late May through sometime in November.
Early season snowmelt over a big western drop (the Lower Falls of the Yellowstone, photographed by the Park Service). Nevada Fall runs the same calendar on the Merced: the melt is the show. “Afternoon fall light on Lower Falls from Lookout Point (54937071695)” — YellowstoneNPS — Public domain
Common questions
Nevada Fall flow season FAQ
The reliable big-water window is May through mid July. Nevada Fall is the higher, bigger sibling on the same Merced River staircase as Vernal, and it keeps the same books: flowing all year on the strength of the upper Merced basin, peaking in late May or June per the Park Service, and thinning steadily through late summer as the high country runs out of snow.
This page reads the USGS gauge on Merced River (Merced R a Happy Isles Bridge nr Yosemite CA, downstream, on the Merced just below the Vernal and Nevada staircase) live in your browser, and shows the latest flow next to the median USGS publishes for today's date, so you can see where today sits in the year. The gauge reads the river, not the brink, so treat it as the trend rather than a turnstile.
No. It carries the upper Merced all year, but the difference between the June thunder and the September ribbon is dramatic. The gauge on this page sits just downstream and shows exactly where the river is on that slide.
Yosemite National Park (National Park Service). Reached on foot beyond Vernal Fall via the steep Mist Trail and John Muir Trail loop. The distant road view is from Glacier Point, whose road the Park Service opens approximately late May through sometime in November. Trail status, closures and safety rules are theirs, and their page is linked on this one; nothing here overrides what they publish.
In their own words: "Be sure to stay on trails—the rock is extremely slick (even when dry) and the ciurrent in the river or creek is very powerful." That sentence is Yosemite National Park (National Park Service)'s, quoted verbatim, and their page is the place to check before you go.
Yosemite Falls in May, running on snowmelt that will be gone by late summer. The National Park Service tells visitors the falls can be dry by August, which is why every falls page here starts from its watershed. “Tourists below Yosemite Falls (39832011431)” by Mike McBey, CC BY 2.0
The tallest waterfall in North America by the Park Service's measure, and the most famous seasonal one: 2,425 feet of snowmelt that thunders in May and is often gone by August.
The 620 foot fall at the gateway of Yosemite Valley: a thundering column in spring, a light swaying veil the rest of the year, and one of the few Yosemite falls that never quite quits.
The 317 foot Merced River step on the Mist Trail, wide as a curtain in June and narrowed to ribbons by late summer; the mist that names the trail is a spring-only drenching.
The winter-only fall off El Capitan that catches sunset in mid to late February and appears to burn: the famous natural firefall, gone entirely by summer.
Flow windows are typical-year climatology drawn from the driver and the agency language quoted above, not forecasts. Live readings and per-date percentiles are U.S. Geological Survey data, public domain; the above-or-below-typical line is our comparison and is labelled as such. Access, trail and safety information belongs to Yosemite National Park (National Park Service). National picture: waterfall season across the US → Hero image: “Afternoon fall light on Lower Falls from Lookout Point (54937071695)” — YellowstoneNPS — Public domain
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