1 School of Agriculture, Food and Ecosystem Sciences, University of Melbourne, Burnley, VIC Australia.
2 Department of Geography, McGill University, Montreal, QC Canada.
3 Department of Biodiversity and People, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ, Leipzig, Germany.
4 Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Institute of Biodiversity, Jena, Germany.
5 German Center for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig, Leipzig, Germany.
6 School of Geography and Environmental Science, University of Southampton, Southampton, UK.
7 Departamento de Conservación de la Biodiversidad y Restauración de Ecosistemas, CSIC-Instituto Pirenaico de Ecología (IPE, CSIC), Jaca, Huesca Spain.
8 Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT USA.
9 Gund Institute for Environment, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT USA.
10 School for Environment and Sustainability, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI USA.
11 Department of Bioresource Engineering, McGill University, Montreal, QC Canada.
12 Human-Environment Systems, Boise State University, Boise, ID USA.
13 Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, Université Grenoble Alpes, Université Savoie Mont-Blanc, CNRS, Grenoble, France.
14 Institute for the Study of International Development, McGill University, Montreal, QC Canada.
15 Natural Capital Project, Stanford University, Stanford, CA USA.
16 Department of Ecology, Institute of Biosciences, Institute of Advanced Studies, University of Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil.
17 Basque Centre for Climate Change (BC3), Leioa, Spain.
18 Ikerbasque Basque Foundation for Science, Bilbao, Spain.
19 Centre for Development and Environment, Univ. Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
20 AgroParisTech, CNRS, Ecole des Ponts ParisTech, Cirad, EHESS, UMR CIRED, Université Paris-Saclay, 94130 Nogent-Sur-Marne, France.
21 CNRS, AgroParisTech, Ecologie Systématique et Evolution, Université Paris-Saclay, 91190 Gif-sur-Yvette, France.
22 Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden.
23 Department of Biology, Concordia University, Montreal, QC Canada.
24 Department of Natural Resource Sciences, McGill University, Sainte-Anne-de-Bellevue, QC Canada.
25 Bieler School of Environment, McGill University, Montreal, QC Canada.

Context: There are urgent calls to transition society to more sustainable trajectories, at scales ranging from local to global. Landscape sustainability (LS), or the capacity for landscapes to provide equitable access to ecosystem services essential for human wellbeing for both current and future generations, provides an operational approach to monitor these transitions. However, the complexity of landscapes complicates how and what to consider when assessing LS.

Objectives: To identify important features of landscapes that remain challenging to consider in LS assessments and provide guidance to strengthen future assessments.

Methods: We conducted two workshops to identify the complex features of landscapes that remain under-considered in LS assessments, and developed guidelines on how to better incorporate these features.

Results: We identify open and connected boundaries and diversity of values as landscape features that must be better considered in LS assessments or risk exacerbating offstage sustainability burdens and power inequalities. We provide guidelines to avoid these pitfalls which emphasize assessing ecosystem service interactions across interconnected landscapes and incorporating local actors' diverse values.

Conclusions: Our guidelines provide a stepping stone for researchers and practitioners to better incorporate landscape complexities into LS assessments to inform landscape-level decisions and actions.