Svalbard is an area of widespread occurrence not only of glaciers but also of ground ice. Field studies conducted in 1987 for the first time provided data on the structure and occurrence of ground ice, from ice cement and segregated ice to massive ice bodies, including buried glacier ice and snowpatch ice, as well as segregated and injected ice in frost mounds and thermokarst cavity ice. Ice cement is the most widespread type of primary ground ice; secondary ice includes vein ice; and buried ice includes buried glacier ice and buried snowpatch ice. The article presents details of the differing characteristics of the ice in each category.