This data set reports the location of snow cover using radiance data acquired by the Visible Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on board the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership (NPP) satellite. Snow cover is identified using the Normalized Difference Snow Index (NDSI) and a series of quality control screens.

As of April 2025, this data set is retired and no longer available for download. Data from the "Golden Month," a 40-day window from 29 August, 2018 to 7 October, 2018 are available by special request from NSIDC User Services. We recommend using <a href="https://nsidc.org/data/vnp10/versions/2">VIIRS/NPP Snow Cover 6-Min L2 Swath 375m, Version 2</a> as an alternative.