This study reports on the glacial cover evolution of the Nevado Coropuna between 1955 and 2003, based on Peruvian topographic maps and satellite images taken from the Landsat 2 and 5 multispectral scanner (MSS), Landsat 5 Thematic Mapper (TM) and Landsat 7 (ETM+). The normalized difference snow index has been applied to these images to estimate the glacierized area of Coropuna. The satellite-based results show that the glacier area was 105 ± 16 km² in 1975 (Landsat 2 MSS), which then reduced to 96 ± 15 km² in 1985 (Landsat 5 MSS), 64 ± 8 km² in 1996 (Landsat 5 TM) and 56 ± 6 km² in 2003 (Landsat 5 TM). Altogether, between 1955 and 2003, Coropuna lost 66 km² of its glacial cover, which represents a mean retreat of 1.4 km² year−1, that is, a loss of 54% in 48 years (11% loss per decade). The maximum rate of retreat occurred during the 1980s and 1990s, a phenomenon probably linked with the pluviometric deficit of El Niño events of 1983 and 1992.