The main purpose of the EUMETSAT project ‘Land Surface Analysis (LSA) Satellite Application Facility (SAF)’ is to increase the benefits from Meteosat Second Generation (MSG) and European Polar System (EPS) satellite data related to land, land-atmosphere interactions and biophysical applications. Although directly designed to improve the observation of meteorological systems, the spectral characteristics, time resolution and global coverage offered by MSG and EPS allow for their use in a broad spectrum of other applications. LSA SAF focusses on the development of techniques, products and algorithms for land biophysical applications.