Prolific birdlife, diverse plants and scenic walks feature strongly in this group of peaceful islands. The Ngaro Aboriginal people named Lindeman Island 'Yara-kimba', the place of snapper-bream fish.

A series of volcanic eruptions 110 million years ago created the Whitsunday area, including islands and the mainland. Like other islands in the Whitsundays, the Lindeman group formed when a mountain range was drowned by rising sea levels. Lindeman Island was formed from the remains of molten rubble spewed from large volcanoes. Smaller islands have a resistant volcanic core; larger islands in the group are made of granite.

Lindeman Islands National Park protects 14 islands featuring a variety of vegetation types including rainforest in sheltered pockets, open forest in drier areas, grasslands and wetlands. Frequent burning by the Ngaro Aboriginal people maintained the grasslands in the area.