Rapid urbanization, marked by massive land-use and land-cover change (LUCC) and explosive population growth, has a significant impact on human activities. To provide a comprehensive understanding of the characteristics of LUCC in the Zhoushan Archipelago, dynamic monitoring and analysis of LUCC was performed using seven Landsat images from 1984 to 2016. The observations and results obtained in this study include the following: the forest of Zhoushan Island was well protected and had a slight increase in the area, yet the spatial distribution remained nearly unchanged; the construction land gradually expanded to all of the coastal plains and southern islands with a trend "first southward, then eastward and finally northward," and the area increased by 571.88%; the coastal cropland/grassland surrounding Zhoushan Island was observed to have been gradually occupied by construction land as noted by a 27.94% decrease in area and the spatial distribution becoming discrete; the mudflat decreased by 93.39% and was mainly converted into construction land; the total land area observed in this study increased by 8.87%, which was achieved primarily by sea reclamation and conversion to construction land and inland water body. These results provide a better understanding of the spatial and temporal evolvement features of LUCC in Zhoushan, China, and the LUCC characteristics that can be expected to significantly support urban management and sustainable development.

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