Restoration Monitoring Tools Compared and How to Choose

No single tool monitors a restoration project on its own. Most organizations combine four kinds: a framework that sets the indicators, field data collection for what only people on the ground can see, remote sensing for change across large areas, and a platform that holds sites, records and reports together. The right mix depends on what you need to prove, to whom, and who will keep the system running.

This editorial shortlist groups common tools by the job they do. It is not a scored ranking. Product pages reviewed October 17, 2026.

Disclosure: Restoration Scope publishes this guide and is included below. The same questions about fit, cost, support and data export apply to our platform.

Compare the main options

Still deciding what to measure? Start with the WRI Restoration Monitoring Tools Guide, which covers many more tools.

For carbon project developers: your methodology sets much of the monitoring design, and the system has to keep eligibility, baselines, plots and activities ready for verification. Read the carbon questions below, our guide to monitoring that carbon investors trust, and ARR carbon monitoring software for the software stack.

Frameworks and guidance

WRI Restoration Monitoring Tools Guide

Use it for: Choosing indicators and a shortlist before software. The guide from Climate Focus and WRI (2023, updated 2024 with carbon methods) walks through five steps: define the area, set indicators, set a baseline, collect repeatable data, report results. Its ToolFinder suggests tools for your needs and shows whether each one costs money. General survey tools such as KoboToolbox and ODK are not listed.

Sources: WRI guide page, about the guide, all tools.

FERM · Framework for Ecosystem Restoration Monitoring

Good fit: Governments, large programmes and organizations reporting toward the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration and global biodiversity Target 2. Run by FAO, it combines a registry, a geospatial platform and a search engine of good practices. Map a site by drawing it or uploading a shapefile, KML or GeoJSON.

Think twice if: You need to run field visits or day-to-day operations. FERM is where restoration is registered and reported, not managed.

Sources: FERM overview, FERM user guide.

Site mapping and reporting platforms

Restor

Good fit: Mapping sites with free ecological context. Restor, a Swiss nonprofit spun off from ETH Zürich, offers more than 30 ecological datasets for free. Paid Restor Insights plans add portfolio grouping, ground-data uploads, disturbance and vegetation-change reports, and an annual report. A SEED biodiversity index is listed as a beta add-on under a non-commercial licence.

Think twice if: You need a field app or a system for planting and monitoring visits. Restor accepts uploaded ground data; check how your field team would capture it.

Sources: Restor, Restor Insights.

TerraMatch

Good fit: Projects funded through TerraFund for AFR100 and other programmes that use it. WRI's TerraMatch connects funding to projects and monitors them with satellite data, field data, geotagged and drone photos, and independent checks. It tracks trees, hectares and jobs, with carbon estimates for selected projects.

Think twice if: You are choosing a system for your own organization, outside a programme that uses it. Organizations can register an account, but reporting follows each funding programme; confirm what is available for independent use.

Sources: TerraMatch, creating a TerraMatch account, TerraFund MRV approach, updated July 2024.

explorer.land

Good fit: Showing projects to donors, sponsors and the public on a map, with monitoring behind them. explorer.land, from OpenForests, offers public, map-based project pages, satellite indicators updated monthly, fire and deforestation alerts and an impact dashboard. It has a free plan and paid plans priced per project.

Think twice if: You need a system for field teams and internal review. Some features, such as geoanalytics and custom data layers, are on higher plans, so check what yours includes and test field capture against your protocol first.

Comparing options? See explorer.land alternatives.

Sources: OpenForests platform, explorer.land plans.

Remote sensing

Collect Earth and Collect Earth Online

Good fit: Measuring land-use and tree-cover change across many sample plots. In these free, open-source tools (Collect Earth from FAO's Open Foris, and Collect Earth Online, built by SERVIR with FAO), trained interpreters classify plots from satellite and aerial imagery, on a desktop or in the browser. TerraFund uses Collect Earth Online to count trees in sample plots over several years.

Think twice if: Your trees are still young. Seedlings are hard to see in most imagery, so survival in the first years still needs field visits.

Sources: Collect Earth, Collect Earth Online, TerraFund MRV approach, updated July 2024.

Global Nature Watch (formerly Global Forest Watch)

Good fit: Free global data on forest and land change, with alerts for disturbance around your sites. WRI renamed Global Forest Watch as Global Nature Watch in 2026, announced in July with a formal launch in September; its map, dashboards, alerts and the Forest Watcher field app carried over.

Think twice if: You expect it to hold your project records. It gives context and early warnings, not a home for planting and survival evidence.

Sources: Global Nature Watch, rename post, WRI announcement.

Field data collection

KoboToolbox and ODK

Good fit: Monitoring that fits a structured form: plot assessments, survival counts, species lists, photos and GPS. Both collect offline. KoboToolbox has a free plan for nonprofits and exports to CSV, KML and GeoJSON. ODK is open source and can capture polygons and use offline maps; you can host it yourself or pay for ODK Cloud.

Think twice if: You want revisits linked without building that setup, or a shared map of every site. ODK Entities can carry a tree or plot from one form to the next, offline, in self-hosted Central or on ODK Cloud's Professional plan; it takes deliberate form design. Otherwise, joining submissions into a record across seasons is a separate job someone has to own.

Sources: KoboToolbox features, ODK and its plans, ODK question types, ODK Entities.

QField and QFieldCloud

Good fit: Teams that already work in QGIS and want those maps, plots and layers in the field, online or offline. QField is open source; QFieldCloud adds team synchronization, with a free tier and paid per-user plans.

Observations can be linked to plots through QGIS relations.

Think twice if: Nobody on the team can maintain QGIS projects, forms and sync. A capable GIS owner matters more than the feature list.

Sources: QField, QFieldCloud pricing, QField relations.

Restoration operations

Restoration Scope

Good fit: Many sites, partners or seasons that need field observations, maps and reporting connected. We build digital infrastructure for nature projects: we connect a team's field data, maps and workflows, and set the system up hands-on with each team.

• The field app captures observations, photos and GPS offline and syncs later.
• The data platform connects tools you already use, such as Kobo forms, spreadsheets and GIS files, with quality checks we set up with you.
• Geospatial workflows run your team's methods on the same boundaries, with forest, climate, terrain and biodiversity map layers for context.
• The app platform gives each team and funder its own dashboards, maps and portals from the same records.

Think twice if: A form tool, a spreadsheet or a funder's platform already covers the job, or you want to configure everything yourselves. A scoped setup adds cost and a dependency a simple project may not need.

See it applied to reforestation, carbon projects and multi-partner programmes.

Where each fits and how they work together

These tools rarely compete head to head. A typical setup uses one from each layer:

Whatever you combine, check that each observation links to a site, plot or tree with a boundary, and that the next visit can find it again. Our guide to tracking tree planting and survival shows how. Then run one real site through your shortlist: capture, sync, review and produce the report you need. Ask for a sample export with IDs, geometry, photos and relationships.

Questions buyers ask

What software suits carbon and biodiversity restoration projects? Software that keeps each measurement tied to its plot, date and evidence. For carbon, check it holds what your methodology needs (eligibility, baselines, measured plots); certification stays with the standard and its verifiers. Our guide to carbon standards for nature projects compares what each one asks for. For biodiversity, check it handles sampling events, species identification and media. Our own biodiversity work is early; Restoration Scope for biodiversity says what we can claim.

What tools help organizations monitor ecosystem restoration? Usually a combination: a framework for indicators, a field tool, remote sensing, and a platform that holds sites, records and reports together. The table above names the main options for each.

Which monitoring platforms combine field observations with geospatial data? QField does it for teams with QGIS skills, Restor and TerraMatch for reporting, and Restoration Scope for day-to-day operations and reporting in one configured system.

Is there free restoration monitoring software? Yes. Collect Earth, Global Nature Watch and self-hosted ODK are free, KoboToolbox has a free plan for nonprofits, and FERM lists no fee. Budget for the people who design forms, join records and clean data.

When does a spreadsheet stop being enough? When several sites, partners or seasons have to be joined by hand to answer a funder's question. Our five-question planting data audit is a quick test.

How do I report monitoring results to funders? From the same records the team works with, with a view for each audience. How to build a monitoring system funders trust goes step by step.

For field apps in more depth, including ArcGIS Survey123, Field Maps and Mergin Maps, see our guide to field-data apps for reforestation teams.