This dataset shows the global distribution of islands. This dataset has been substantially refined through the work of a number of organisations, including UNEP World Conservation Monitoring Centre, Island Conservation, the University of California, Santa Cruz, BirdLife International, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, and the Global Island Network. The geographic boundary dataset is originally based on Open Street Map data (© OpenStreetMap contributors), itself based on a 1:75,000 Landsat product from the US National Geospatial - Intelligence Agency. Relevant information (essentially the island names) from version 1.0 (dataset ID WCMC-005) has been retained in subsequent versions. Island Conservation (IC) carried out significants improvements on version 2.0 of the dataset during 2015, thereby resulting in version 2.1 (November 2015). Over 3,000 islands were validated and edits were made to polygons where necessary (e.g. a modification to area or location, a deletion, or an addition). A record of changescarried out is available with permission from IC. In consultation with IC, UNEPWCMC streamlined the attribute table of version 2.1, to remove unnecessary fields, including organisation-specific island IDs (island ID code used by the partner Island Conservation (id_ic); island ID code used by the partner RSPB (id_rspb)). Versions 2 replaces version 1.0 (dataset ID WCMC-005), which is based on a lower resolution dataset from the GSHHS (Global Self-consistent, Hierarchical, Highresolution Geography) Database.