This dataset provides daily climatological mean sea surface temperature (SST) on a global 0.05° latitude-longitude grid, derived from the SST CCI analysis data for the period 1991 to 2020 (30 years).

The dataset has been produced as part of the version 3 Climate Data Record (CDR) produced by the European Space Agency (ESA) Climate Change Initiative (CCI) Sea Surface Temperature project (ESA SST_cci). The CDR accurately maps the surface temperature of the global oceans over the period 1980 to 2021 using observations from many satellites, with a high degree of independence from in situ measurements. The data provide independently quantified SSTs to a quality suitable for climate research.

This CDR Version 3.0 product supersedes the CDR v2.2 product. Compared to the previous version the major changes are:

* Longer time series: 1980 to 2021 (previous CDR was Sept 1981 to 2016)
* Improved retrieval to reduce systematic biases using bias-aware optimal methods (for single view sensors)
* Improved retrieval with respect to desert-dust aerosols
* Addition of dual-view SLSTR data from 2016 onwards
* Addition of early AVHRR/1 data in 1980s, and improved AVHRR processing to reduce data gaps in 1980s
* Use of full-resolution MetOp AVHRR data (previously used ‘global area coverage’ Level 1 data)
* Inclusion of L2P passive microwave AMSR data

Data are made freely and openly available under a Creative Commons License by Attribution (CC By 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

When citing this dataset please also cite the associated data paper:

Embury, O., Merchant, C.J., Good, S.A., Rayner, N.A., Høyer, J.L., Atkinson, C., Block, T., Alerskans, E., Pearson, K.J., Worsfold, M., McCarroll, N., Donlon, C. Satellite-based time-series of sea-surface temperature since 1980 for climate applications. Scientific Data 11, 326 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41597-024-03147-w