---
id: data-sources/protected-planet
about:
  label: Protected Planet
  description: >-
    UNEP-WCMC's World Database on Protected Areas: the world's protected areas
    and other effective area-based conservation measures, updated monthly from
    government and other submissions
  tags:
    - protected areas
    - biodiversity
    - global
    - monthly
    - wdpa
datasource:
  homepage: 'https://www.protectedplanet.net/en'
  coverage: 'global, terrestrial and marine'
  cadence: monthly
open:
  source: unknown
  data: open
  api: unknown
  participation: partly
  note: >-
    The database can be downloaded from the site and is built from submissions
    by governments, NGOs, landowners and communities; its terms of use were not
    read for this entry.
domains:
  - ecology
  - places
provenance:
  origin: agent
  sources:
    - title: Explore the World's Protected Areas
      url: 'https://www.protectedplanet.net/en'
    - title: Protected Areas (WDPA)
      url: 'https://www.protectedplanet.net/en/thematic-areas/wdpa'
    - title: Protected Planet Report 2024
      url: 'https://digitalreport.protectedplanet.net/'
  created: '2026-10-18'
  reviewed: '2026-10-18'
  reviewed_by: 'Claude, from the sources listed'
  status: draft
---
The World Database on Protected Areas (WDPA) is a joint project of the UN Environment Programme and the International Union for Conservation of Nature.[^2] The UN Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre in Cambridge manages it, and Protected Planet is its public site.[^1,2] Other effective area-based conservation measures (OECMs) are places outside formal protected areas that still conserve nature.[^1] The site says the WDPA is the most up to date and complete source of data on protected areas and OECMs.[^1] Governments, non-governmental organisations, landowners and communities submit the data.[^1]

The site also holds the World Database on OECMs, a database of management-effectiveness assessments (GD-PAME) and the IUCN Green List.[^1] Thematic pages cover connectivity and equitable governance.[^1] Running global statistics in October 2026 counted 506,250 protected areas and 7,749 OECMs.[^1,2] Together they covered 18.69 per cent of land and inland waters and 10.04 per cent of the sea.[^1]

The database was established in 1981.[^2] The site traces its mandate to a 1959 UN Economic and Social Council resolution calling for a list of national parks and equivalent reserves.[^2] Progress on the [30 by 30 target](/mandates/thirty-by-thirty/) is officially measured against the WDPA.[^3]