Exploration
Space Missions
Crewed and robotic missions have transformed how we understand the Solar System. Browse active, upcoming, and completed missions — including the first landings on the Moon and Mars, the Voyager Grand Tour, and current probes at Jupiter, Saturn, and Mercury.
All missions
Filter by status and follow any mission for launch details, discoveries, and lasting legacy.
- activeNASA · ESA · CSA
James Webb Space Telescope
A powerful infrared observatory studying the earliest galaxies and exoplanet atmospheres.
Destination: Sun–Earth L2 Lagrange point
View mission - activeNASA
Artemis Program
NASA's ongoing program to return humans to the Moon and prepare for future crewed Mars missions.
Destination: The Moon
View mission - activeNASA
Perseverance Rover
The first Mars rover designed to collect and cache carefully documented samples for possible return to Earth.
Destination: Mars — Jezero Crater
View mission - upcomingNASA
Europa Clipper
A spacecraft investigating whether Jupiter's icy moon Europa could support life.
Destination: Europa (moon of Jupiter)
View mission - activeNASA
Parker Solar Probe
The first spacecraft to fly through the Sun's outer atmosphere, or corona.
Destination: The Sun's corona
View mission - activeNASA
Voyager 1
The most distant human-made object and the first spacecraft to enter interstellar space.
Destination: Interstellar space
View mission - completedNASA · ESA · ASI
Cassini–Huygens
The first spacecraft to orbit Saturn and the first landing in the outer Solar System.
Destination: Saturn system
View mission - activeNASA
New Horizons
The first spacecraft to visit Pluto, now studying other objects in the Kuiper Belt.
Destination: Kuiper Belt
View mission - upcomingNASA
Dragonfly
A rotorcraft mission set to fly across the surface of Saturn's moon Titan.
Destination: Titan
View mission - upcomingNASA · ESA
Mars Sample Return
A proposed multi-mission campaign to bring samples collected by Perseverance back to Earth.
Destination: Mars — return to Earth
View mission - completedNASA
Mariner 10
The first spacecraft to visit Mercury and the first to use a planetary gravity assist.
Destination: Mercury and Venus
View mission - completedNASA
MESSENGER
The first spacecraft to orbit Mercury, mapping the planet and confirming polar water ice.
Destination: Mercury
View mission - activeESA · JAXA
BepiColombo
A two-orbiter joint European–Japanese mission to Mercury, the most comprehensive Mercury investigation planned.
Destination: Mercury
View mission - completedSoviet Union
Venera Program
The Soviet program that achieved the first successful landing and first surface images from another planet.
Destination: Venus
View mission - completedNASA
Magellan
The mission that produced the first near-global high-resolution radar map of Venus.
Destination: Venus
View mission - completedJAXA
Akatsuki
Japan's Venus climate orbiter, its first successful planetary orbiter beyond Earth.
Destination: Venus
View mission - completedNASA
Apollo Program
The crewed lunar program that first landed humans on the Moon.
Destination: The Moon
View mission - activeNASA · Roscosmos · ESA · JAXA · CSA
International Space Station
The largest long-duration international research platform assembled in orbit.
Destination: Low Earth orbit
View mission - activeNASA · USGS
Landsat
The longest continuous space-based record of Earth's land surface.
Destination: Earth (land surface)
View mission - completedNASA
Viking Program
The first fully successful U.S. mission to land and operate on Mars and the first designed to search for life there.
Destination: Mars
View mission - activeNASA
Curiosity Rover
A car-size Mars laboratory studying whether Gale Crater ever offered habitable conditions.
Destination: Mars — Gale Crater
View mission - activeNASA
Voyager 2
The only spacecraft to visit Uranus and Neptune and the only probe to fly past all four giant planets.
Destination: Interstellar space
View mission - completedNASA
Galileo
The first spacecraft to orbit Jupiter and to deploy a probe into a giant planet's atmosphere.
Destination: Jupiter and its moons
View mission - activeNASA
Juno
The first solar-powered spacecraft designed for sustained operations at Jupiter.
Destination: Jupiter and selected moons
View mission - completedNASA
Apollo 11
The mission that first landed humans on the Moon in July 1969.
Destination: The Moon
View mission