In a pilot study, the Swiss Federal Institute for Environment (FOEN) intended to test measurement equipment, logistics, data processing and data quality in view of the potential deployment of a Swiss-wide temperature monitoring network of lakes. FOEN mandated the Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology (Eawag) to design a pilot monitoring for 8 small lakes at various altitudes and these were monitored over around 3 years (2021 - 2024).