This dataset holds the restart files for the MPI-ESM1-2 simulation CMIP6 MPI-ESM1-2 esm-hist_r1i1p1f1-LR (original experiment_id vga0225) - restart files. The simulation has been conducted in the context of the CMIP6 activities. The CMIP6 experiments are described at https://wcrp-cmip.org/cmip6/ The CMIP6 experiments have been performed with various model versions of MPI-ESM1-2 by the MPI-M, DKRZ and DWD. The low-resolution version MPI-ESM1-2-LR has been run with T63L47 (192 x 96 gridpoints; 47 vertical layers) for ECHAM6/JSBACH and GR15 (ca. 1.5 deg) of MPIOM/HAMOCC. The high-resolution version MPI-ESM1-2-HR has been run with T127L95 (384 x 192 gridpoints; 95 vertical layers) for ECHAM6/JSBACH and TP04 (tripolar grid, ca. 0.4 deg) of MPIOM/HAMOCC. The single archive files each contain 1-10 years of restart data of all submodels (ECHAM6, JSBACH, MPIOM, HAMOCC) as well as the coupler (OASIS3MCT). The directory structure in the archive files is as follows: <exp-id>/restart/<model>/*.tar with the original exp-id being used within the .tar-files, if it differs from the CMIP6 exp-id.