The data is used in a comparative analysis of the diet of one of the globally most numerous myctophids, the Glacier lantern fish Benthosema glaciale, across four deep basins of the North Atlantic. We present taxonomic information, weight and number of prey items of each fish that has stomach content, as long as it has been possible to assign prey to a species or other taxonomic category. Unidentified prey usually had a high degree of digestion and individual items could not be counted, but could be weighed. Sampling were undertaken onboard the RV G.O. Sars during a six week long transatlantic scientific survey from Bergen (Norway) to Nuuk (Greenland) and back to Bergen in May and June 2013. The Harstad trawl is a graded (variable mesh size), small mid-water trawl with 20 m vertical opening and 15 m wing spread (Godø et al., 1993). The Macroplankton trawl on the other hand is a light pelagic trawl that has a nominal 6x6 m trawl opening and mesh size of 3 mm square light opening (8 mm stretched, knot to knot) from the trawl mouth along the entire trawl length to the cod-end (Hassel et al., 2017; Klevjer et al., 2020).

Prey digestion level:Undigested (1): Digestion has not begun, and the stomach content appears fresh.Digestion commenced (2): Species can be easily identified.Advanced digestion (3): The species can no longer be identified but can be separated into systematic groups.Late-stage digestion (4): Only residues like eyes and robust part of animals can separated into systematic groups.Nearly complete digestion (5): The stomach contents are stewed or mushy, cannot be identified or counted.Quality of biological analysis: "Low" was also used to indicate that these fish were considered part of a training set not used in further analysis.Funding and ship time were also received from the Institute of Marine Research, Bergen, Norway.