Using remote sensing data, we estimated sandland vegetation coverage (VC) during the growing season from 2000 to 2014 in the Otindag Sandland, and analyzed the spatial-temporal characteristics of VC. Impacts of climatic factors and land use/cover change on the sandland VC were primarily distinguished by statistical analysis. The results showed that the sandland VC was increased with fluctuations during the growing season in the Otindag Sandland from 2000 to 2014, the average annual VC was 0.423 in the study area with an average increase rate of 0.003 6/yr. For the spatial pattern, the VC in the northern, central and southern fringe regions of the study area showed an increasing trend, but no obvious trend was observed in the eastern and part of the western regions. As a whole, the annual VC variation was positively correlated with precipitation, the correlation coefficient was 0.86, indicating that precipitation was the dominant driving force of vegetation dynamics. The correlation coefficient between VC and temperature is -0.42. The composition of land use structure was evaluated using data derived from the Landsat images obtained in 2000, 2006 and 2013 with the 3S technology. The study area was primarily comprised of grassland, which occupied 85.25% of the total study area. The results revealed that grassland and forest increased more than any other types of land (except for construction land), with their area increasing from 29 637.30 km2 and 58.24 km2 to 30 619.36 km2 and 64.43 km2, respectively, while other types of land decreased to different degrees. Overall, these results indicated that some farmland was transformed to grassland and forest, and some unused land was transformed to grassland and water body. High-coverage grassland, forest and farmland increased in the area. The annual VC variation was correlated with land use/cover change, which was an important factor driving the VC increase in the Otindag Sandland during the study period.