Ponds and pondscapes (i.e., networks of ponds in the landscape) are essential freshwater ecosystems that host a particularly rich biodiversity as well as deliver various Nature’s Contributions to People (NCPs), yet they have historically been dismissed as insignificant and have suffered from a lack of protection and study. In a context of global environmental change, it is crucial to monitor these ecosystems to know how they are faring and to guide conservation actions such as their protection, management, restoration and creation. This thesis investigated long-term trends in pond biodiversity and the benefits of implementing Nature-based Solutions (NbS) such as pond creation. Our results show a high resilience of pond species richness over time, in both high-elevation and lowland pondscapes, but also an important dynamism within metacommunities, with substantial species dispersal and turnover between habitats in lowland areas. This highlights the importance of conserving ponds on a landscape scale. Moreover, pond creation as NbS can offer great benefits to biodiversity as long as ponds are designed with this objective in mind, as evidenced by two case studies: i) the creation of flood management ponds in Scotland, and ii) the creation of diverse ponds for various purposes in the region of Geneva, Switzerland. To safeguard freshwater biodiversity and ecosystem services, it remains important to conserve pondscapes and to create ponds, as a way to compensate dramatic declines in habitat in past centuries.