The first annual oil palm area dataset (AOPD) for Malaysia and Indonesia from 2001 to 2016 was produced by integrating multiple satellite datasets and a change-detection algorithm (BFAST). This dataset reveals that oil palm plantations have expanded from 5.69 to 19.05 M ha in the two countries during the past 16 years. The AOPD is useful in understanding the deforestation process in Southeast Asia and may serve as land-use change inputs in dynamic global vegetation models.