Over 60% of the world’s reefs experience damage from local activities such as overfishing, coastal development, and watershed pollution. Land-based sources of pollution are a critical threat to coral reefs, and understanding “ridge-to-reef” changes is urgently needed to improve management and coral survival in the Anthropocene. We review existing literature on spatial-ecological connections between land use and coral health, specifically examining vegetative, agricultural, urban, and other land-use types. In general, forested land use is positively related to metrics of coral condition, while anthropogenic land uses like urban development and agriculture drive a decline in coral cover, diversity, colony size, and structural complexity. However, land-use and land-cover impacts vary across time and space, and small portions of the landscape (e.g., discrete segments of unpaved roads, grazed and scalded hillsides) may have an outsized effect on reef pollution, presenting opportunities for targeted conservation. Some coral species show resilience under land-use and land-cover change, and the impact of land use on coral recovery from bleaching remains an active area of research. Finally, a spatial bibliography of existing literature reveals that most ridge-to-reef studies focus on a handful of regional hotspots, surface water, and watershed-scale dynamics; more research is needed to address groundwater connectivity and to compare land-use impacts across multiple regions and scales. Approaches from landscape ecology that assess spatial patterns of, and synergies between, interlocking land cover may assist conservation managers in designing more resilient reefscapes.

Although cross generation (CGP) and multigenerational (MGP) plasticity have been identified as mechanisms of acclimation to global change, the weight of evidence indicates that parental conditioning over generations is not a panacea to rescue stress sensitivity in offspring. For many species, there were no benefits of parental conditioning. Even when improved performance was observed, this waned over time within a generation or across generations and fitness declined. CGP and MGP studies identified resilient species with stress tolerant genotypes in wild populations and selected family lines. Several bivalves possess favourable stress tolerance and phenotypically plastic traits potentially associated with genetic adaptation to life in habitats where they routinely experience temperature and/or acidification stress. These traits will be important to help ‘climate proof’ shellfish ventures. Species that are naturally stress tolerant and those that naturally experience a broad range of environmental conditions are good candidates to provide insights into the physiological and molecular mechanisms involved in CGP and MGP. It is challenging to conduct ecologically relevant global change experiments over the long times commensurate with the pace of changing climate. As a result, many studies present stressors in a shock‐type exposure at rates much faster than projected scenarios. With more gradual stressor introduction over longer experimental durations and in context with conditions species are currently acclimatized and/or adapted to, the outcomes for sensitive species might differ. We highlight the importance to understand primordial germ cell development and the timing of gametogenesis with respect to stressor exposure. Although multigenerational exposure to global change stressors currently appears limited as a universal tool to rescue species in the face of changing climate, natural proxies of future conditions (upwelling zones, CO₂ vents, naturally warm habitats) show that phenotypic adjustment and/or beneficial genetic selection is possible for some species, indicating complex plasticity–adaptation interactions.

Predicting effects of rapid climate change on populations depends on measuring the effects of climate stressors on performance, and potential for adaptation. Adaptation to stressful climatic conditions requires heritable genetic variance for stress tolerance present in populations. We quantified genetic variation in tolerance of early development of the ecologically important sea urchin Centrostephanus rodgersii to near-future (2100) ocean conditions projected for the southeast Australian global change hot spot. Multiple dam-sire crosses were used to quantify the interactive effects of warming (+2–4°C) and acidification (−0.3−0.5 pH units) across twenty-seven family lines. Acidification, but not temperature, decreased the percentage of cleavage stage embryos. In contrast, temperature, but not acidification decreased the percentage of gastrulation. Cleavage success in response to both stressors was strongly affected by sire identity. Sire and dam identity significantly affected gastrulation and both interacted with temperature to determine developmental success. Positive genetic correlations for gastrulation indicated that genotypes that did well at lower pH also did well in higher temperatures. Significant genotype (sire) by environment interactions for both stressors at gastrulation indicated the presence of heritable variation in thermal tolerance and the ability of embryos to respond to changing environments. The significant influence of dam may be due to maternal provisioning (maternal genotype or environment) and/or offspring genotype. It appears that early development in this ecologically important sea urchin is not constrained in adapting to the multiple stressors of ocean warming and acidification. The presence of tolerant genotypes indicates the potential to adapt to concurrent warming and acidification, contributing to the resilience of C. rodgersii in a changing ocean.

Coral reefs face an uncertain future and may not recover naturally from anthropogenic climate change. Coral restoration is needed to rehabilitate degraded reefs and to sustain biodiversity. There is a need for baseline data on global reef distribution, composition, and condition to provide targets for conservation and restoration. Remote sensing can address this issue and is currently underutilized in reef research and restoration. This synthesis integrates current capabilities of remote sensing with key reef restoration criteria, to facilitate coral restoration success. Research into the development of a spectral database for corals, linking habitat type and extent with predator abundance, and identification of species-specific acoustic signatures are needed to advance the use of remote sensing in reef restoration design and monitoring. Reciprocally, reef restoration efforts should innovate at ecosystem, regional, and global levels using remote sensing, to preserve as much of the coral reef biome as possible with continued ocean-climate change.