MOD21A1D.061 Terra Land Surface Temperature and 3-Band Emissivity Daily Global 1km

  • MOD21A1D provides daily land surface temperature (LST) and emissivity data at a 1,000-meter resolution, derived from daytime Terra MODIS observations.

  • The dataset covers the globe and includes quality control measures for cloud cover, atmospheric conditions, and LST/emissivity accuracy.

  • LST values are calculated as a weighted average of cloud-free observations with good accuracy, ensuring reliable temperature estimates.

  • Data is available from February 24, 2000, to December 10, 2024, and can be accessed through NASA's LP DAAC and Google Earth Engine.

  • MODIS data and products acquired through the LP DAAC have no restrictions on subsequent use, sale, or redistribution.
MODIS/061/MOD21A1D
Dataset Availability
2000-02-24T00:00:00Z–2025-09-30T00:00:00Z
Dataset Provider
Earth Engine Snippet
ee.ImageCollection("MODIS/061/MOD21A1D")
Cadence
1 Day
Tags
climate daily emissivity global lst nasa surface-temperature terra usgs

Description

The MOD21A1D dataset is produced daily from daytime Level 2 Gridded (L2G) intermediate LST products at a spatial resolution of 1,000 meters. The L2G process maps the daily MOD21 swath granules onto a sinusoidal MODIS grid and stores all observations falling over a gridded cell for a given day. The MOD21A1 algorithm sorts through these observations for each cell and estimates the final LST value as an average from all observations that are cloud free and have good LST&E accuracies. The daytime average is weighted by the observation coverage for that cell. Only observations having an observation coverage greater than a 15% threshold are considered. The MOD21A1D product contains the calculated LST as well as quality control, the three emissivity bands, view zenith angle, and time of observation.

Documentation:

Bands

Pixel Size
1000 meters

Bands

Name Units Min Max Pixel Size Description
LST_1KM K 7500 65535 meters

Land Surface Temperature
QC meters

Quality Control
Emis_29 0 255 meters

Band 29 emissivity
Emis_31 1 255 meters

Band 31 emissivity
Emis_32 1 255 meters

Band 32 emissivity
View_Angle deg 0 130 meters

MODIS view zenith angle
View_Time h 0 240 meters

Time of MODIS observation

Terms of Use

Terms of Use

MODIS data and products acquired through the LP DAAC have no restrictions on subsequent use, sale, or redistribution.

Citations

Citations:

DOIs

Explore with Earth Engine

Code Editor (JavaScript)

var dataset = ee.ImageCollection('MODIS/061/MOD21A1D')
                  .filter(ee.Filter.date('2018-01-01', '2018-05-01'));
var landSurfaceTemperature = dataset.select('LST_1KM');
var landSurfaceTemperatureVis = {
  min: 216.0,
  max: 348.0,
  palette: [
    '040274', '040281', '0502a3', '0502b8', '0502ce', '0502e6',
    '0602ff', '235cb1', '307ef3', '269db1', '30c8e2', '32d3ef',
    '3be285', '3ff38f', '86e26f', '3ae237', 'b5e22e', 'd6e21f',
    'fff705', 'ffd611', 'ffb613', 'ff8b13', 'ff6e08', 'ff500d',
    'ff0000', 'de0101', 'c21301', 'a71001', '911003'
  ],
};
Map.setCenter(6.746, 46.529, 2);
Map.addLayer(
    landSurfaceTemperature, landSurfaceTemperatureVis,
    'Land Surface Temperature');
Open in Code Editor
The MOD21A1D dataset is produced daily from daytime Level 2 Gridded (L2G) intermediate LST products at a spatial resolution of 1,000 meters. The L2G process maps the daily MOD21 swath granules onto a sinusoidal MODIS grid and stores all observations falling over a gridded cell for a given day. The …
MODIS/061/MOD21A1D, climate,daily,emissivity,global,lst,nasa,surface-temperature,terra,usgs
2000-02-24T00:00:00Z/2025-09-30T00:00:00Z
-90 -180 90 180
Google Earth Engine