The data base "Characters of Lichens" is based on files with descriptions of lichens of the internet project "Descriptions of Lichens" (Feuerer 2017, continuoulsy updated). The PHP script linked with a mySQL data base is available since 2007. The last update from 1 January 2017 includes all data till the end of 2016. Up to now queries for 1064 chemical substances, 633 herbaria and their type collections and the single years and their types are possible. Information on data quality can be found in the data collections "Checklists of Lichens" as well as "Distributions of Lichens".