Skip to main content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Official websites use .gov
A .gov website belongs to an official government organization in the United States.

Secure .gov websites use HTTPS
A lock ( ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .gov website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Skip to content

Annual National Land Cover Database (NLCD) Collection 1 Summary Land Cover Change Index 1985-2023 Conterminous United States

Metadata Updated: October 30, 2025

The USGS Land Cover program has combined the tried-and-true methodologies from premier land cover projects, National Land Cover Database (NLCD) and Land Change Monitoring, Assessment, and Projection (LCMAP), together with modern innovations in geospatial deep learning technologies to create the next generation of land cover and land change information. The product suite is called, “Annual NLCD” and includes six annual products that represent land cover and surface change characteristics of the U.S.: 1) Land Cover, 2) Land Cover Change, 3) Land Cover Confidence, 4) Fractional Impervious Surface, 5) Impervious Descriptor, and 6) Spectral Change Day of Year. These land cover science product algorithms harness the remotely sensed Landsat data record to provide state-of-the-art land surface change information needed by scientists, resource managers, and decision-makers. Annual NLCD uses a modernized, integrated approach to map, monitor, synthesize, and understand the complexities of land use, cover, and condition change. With this first release, Annual NLCD, Collection 1.0, the six products are available for the Conterminous U.S. for 1985 – 2023. Questions about the Annual NLCD product suite can be directed to the Annual NLCD mapping team at USGS EROS, Sioux Falls, SD (605) 594-6151 or custserv@usgs.gov. See included spatial metadata for more details. The Land Cover Change Index product summarizes Annual NLCD Land Cover change into 15 change classes. These classes are intended to communicate thematic change impact, and were based on the following hierarchy: water, urban, wetland, herbaceous wetland, agriculture, cultivated crop, hay pasture, rangeland grass and shrub, barren, woody wetland, forest type, urban within, forest transition mixed rangeland and forest change, and forest transition mixed rangeland and shrub/scrub change.

Access & Use Information

Public: This dataset is intended for public access and use. License: No license information was provided. If this work was prepared by an officer or employee of the United States government as part of that person's official duties it is considered a U.S. Government Work.

Downloads & Resources

Dates

Metadata Created Date September 13, 2025
Metadata Updated Date October 30, 2025

Metadata Source

Harvested from DOI USGS DCAT-US

Additional Metadata

Resource Type Dataset
Metadata Created Date September 13, 2025
Metadata Updated Date October 30, 2025
Publisher U.S. Geological Survey
Maintainer
Identifier http://datainventory.doi.gov/id/dataset/usgs-66f5b27dd34e791ae5dfd2fa
Data Last Modified 2024-10-24T00:00:00Z
Category geospatial
Public Access Level public
Bureau Code 010:12
Metadata Context https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.jsonld
Metadata Catalog ID https://ddi.doi.gov/usgs-data.json
Schema Version https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema
Catalog Describedby https://project-open-data.cio.gov/v1.1/schema/catalog.json
Harvest Object Id 1ea4ff24-f85d-48ea-b9d5-a776095845ea
Harvest Source Id 2b80d118-ab3a-48ba-bd93-996bbacefac2
Harvest Source Title DOI USGS DCAT-US
Metadata Type geospatial
Old Spatial -130.2328, 21.7423, -63.6722, 52.8510
Source Datajson Identifier True
Source Hash ce520c836de0c13c3114438fcb72cd3be7620cb71cd87480c978617711f4d905
Source Schema Version 1.1
Spatial {"type": "Polygon", "coordinates": -130.2328, 21.7423, -130.2328, 52.8510, -63.6722, 52.8510, -63.6722, 21.7423, -130.2328, 21.7423}

Didn't find what you're looking for? Suggest a dataset here.