For half a century the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre (CCDC) has produced the Cambridge Structural Database (CSD) to allow scientists worldwide to share, search and reuse small molecule crystal structure data. An entry in the CSD is often seen as 'just' a set of coordinates, but the associated metadata (data that describes and gives information about other data), is essential to contextualise an entry. Data that describe the substance studied, the experiment performed and the dataset as a whole are all vital. This presentation, timed to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the CSD, will look at how metadata is used from deposition to dissemination of the CSD. We will look at how recent developments surrounding metadata have been targeted to improve the discoverability, validation and reuse of crystal structure data before looking to see what the future may hold.