ESA Global Land Cover Map at 10-Meter Resolution

A global land cover map with 11 distinct land cover classes. The dataset provides worldwide coverage at a 10-meter spatial resolution, organized into 3x3 degree tiles. It was produced for the reference year 2021 by a consortium led by VITO and includes partners like Brockmann Consult and Wageningen University.

Use Cases

• Classify land cover types like trees, water, and built-up areas from the 11-class map layer for environmental change analysis.
• Analyze spatial patterns of agricultural land or urban expansion using the 10-meter resolution raster data.
• Validate or train machine learning models for satellite image segmentation using the high-resolution land cover labels.
• Assess regional biodiversity by mapping forest cover and shrubland distributions from the classified tiles.

Strengths

• Global spatial coverage across all land areas.
• High 10-meter spatial resolution for detailed land cover analysis.
• Standardized 11 land cover classes enabling consistent global comparison.

Limitations

• Ocean areas and inner ice sheets are excluded and do not have corresponding tiles.
• Data is provided as large raster tiles (3x3 degrees), which may require significant storage and processing power.
• The product versioning (e.g., v200) indicates potential iterative improvements, requiring users to verify version suitability.

Provenance

Source

European Space Agency (ESA) WorldCover project, produced by a consortium led by VITO.

Collection Method

Generated from satellite remote sensing data, processed and classified into land cover types.

Time Range

Reference year 2021.

Freshness

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Geography

Global land coverage.