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From astronauts circling the moon to spacecraft reaching Mercury and asteroids close to Earth, 2026 is shaping as much as be a landmark 12 months for house exploration.
Governments and personal corporations alike are getting ready missions that would redefine how people dwell and work in house, deepen our understanding of the photo voltaic system and push exploration farther than it is gone in a long time.
1) Artemis 2 sends astronauts around the moon
Flying aboard the Orion spacecraft atop the Space Launch System (SLS) megarocket, Artemis 2 will test life-support systems, navigation and communications in deep space ahead of future lunar landings. The crew includes NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman (commander), Victor Glover (pilot) and Christina Koch (mission specialist), along with Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen (mission specialist). The mission is currently targeting a launch no earlier than Feb. 5, 2026, though the exact date will depend on technical readiness, with the available launch window extending into April.
Artemis 2 is a critical proving ground for future lunar landings, including Artemis 3. Its success would mark the true beginning of NASA’s sustained crewed return to the moon.
2) SpaceX pushes Starship toward Mars-ready milestones
In parallel, SpaceX is working to achieve rapid reuse of both Starship elements — the Super Heavy booster and Ship upper stage. Even without an interplanetary launch, successfully reaching orbit, transferring propellant in space and quickly reusing hardware would represent a major technological leap — and could make 2026 a pivotal year in Starship’s path toward enabling sustained human exploration beyond Earth.
3) Blue Origin’s Mark 1 lunar lander demonstration
Blue Origin plans to launch its Blue Moon Mark 1 (MK1) lunar lander on a robotic demonstration mission to the moon in early 2026, with the spacecraft targeting a landing near Shackleton Crater at the moon’s south pole.
Standing about 26 feet (8 meters) tall, the lander is designed to deliver heavy cargo to the lunar surface and will fly atop the company’s New Glenn rocket. MK1 is the largest commercial lunar cargo lander ever built, capable of carrying significantly more payload than any of the vehicles sponsored by NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. Although uncrewed, the mission will test precision landing technologies and surface operations critical to future lunar infrastructure, marking Blue Origin’s first attempt to reach the moon and a major step toward establishing commercial lunar logistics.
Ahead of launch, the company plans to conduct fully integrated ground tests to validate MK1’s systems and confirm flight readiness. If all goes according to plan, the mission’s payload will include NASA’s SCALPSS (Stereo Cameras for Lunar Plume Surface Studies) instrument, which will image the lunar surface during and after descent to study how landing plumes interact with the moon’s regolith.
4) Boeing’s Starliner-1 mission to the International Space Station
Rather than carrying astronauts, Starliner-1 will focus on validating spacecraft upgrades, testing systems performance and delivering cargo to the orbiting lab as Boeing and NASA work toward full crew certification. NASA has since adjusted Boeing’s Commercial Crew contract, emphasizing safety and additional testing before Starliner resumes astronaut flights. The mission remains a critical step toward establishing Starliner as a second operational U.S. crew vehicle alongside Crew Dragon. Successfully completing the flight would help restore long-term redundancy for ISS crew rotations and move Boeing closer to full certification under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.
5) Haven-1 launches first commercial space station
California-based startup Vast plans to launch Haven-1, the world’s first privately developed stand-alone space station, no earlier than May 2026.
The single-module station is designed to host short-duration crewed missions of up to 30 days, supporting research experiments, commercial activities and technology demonstrations. Haven-1 will ride into orbit aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, with astronauts traveling to and from the station in Crew Dragon capsules. If successful, the mission could herald a new era of commercial space stations, potentially replacing or supplementing the aging ISS in the coming decade.
6) China’s Tianwen-2 reaches a ‘quasi-moon’ asteroid
Tianwen-2 will attempt to collect surface samples, which are planned to return to Earth in late 2027, providing rare material for scientists to study the early solar system. Some researchers speculate the asteroid could be a fragment of the moon, making the samples especially valuable, though this hypothesis has yet to be confirmed. After the sample return, Tianwen-2 will continue its journey toward a main-belt comet for future exploration.
7) Rocket Lab debuts its Neutron rocket
Rocket Lab plans the first launch of its Neutron rocket in mid-2026, marking a major expansion of the company beyond small-satellite launches. Standing roughly 131 feet (40 meters) tall, Neutron is designed to be partially reusable, with the first stage capable of landing vertically for rapid turnaround between flights.
Neutron is intended to deploy large satellite constellations, carry national security payloads and eventually support crewed missions, representing Rocket Lab’s entry into the competitive heavy-lift launch market. The rocket’s debut has been delayed several times from its original 2024-2025 target as Rocket Lab refined the design and conducted additional testing to ensure reliability. Its upcoming launch will also demonstrate the company’s innovative payload fairing, nicknamed the “Hungry Hippo,” which opens and closes in orbit to facilitate payload deployment and recovery, underscoring Rocket Lab’s ambitions to compete with SpaceX and other major providers.
8) China launches the Chang’e 7 mission to the lunar south pole
Chang’e 7 will also deploy a relay satellite to ensure continuous communication with Earth and to support scientific observations in the polar region. The mission aims to locate and characterize potential water-ice deposits, assess terrain hazards and demonstrate technologies needed for future crewed lunar missions, representing a key step in China’s long-term plan for a sustained presence on the moon.
9) ESA’s Hera mission arrives at the Didymos asteroid system
The European Space Agency’s (ESA) Hera spacecraft is scheduled to arrive at the binary asteroid system Didymos in November 2026 to investigate the aftermath of NASA’s 2022 DART impact, which successfully altered the orbit of the moonlet Dimorphos.
Hera will conduct high-resolution mapping of the impact crater, measure the asteroid’s mass and internal structure, and deploy two cubesats for close-up observations of surface properties and debris. By combining these data, scientists will gain critical insight into how kinetic impactors can change an asteroid’s trajectory — a key capability for planetary defense against potential Earth-bound threats and validating deflection techniques demonstrated by the DART mission.
10) BepiColombo finally reaches Mercury
After an eight-year journey involving multiple gravity-assist flybys of Earth, Venus and Mercury, ESA and JAXA’s BepiColombo mission will enter orbit around Mercury in November 2026. Over the course of its long cruise, the spacecraft has returned valuable science data and close-up images while testing its instruments in the extreme environment near the sun.
Once BepiColombo reaches Mercury, the spacecraft will separate into two science orbiters: ESA’s Mercury Planetary Orbiter (MPO), which will study the planet’s surface and interior, and JAXA’s Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter (MMO), which will focus on Mercury’s powerful and highly dynamic magnetic environment. Together, the orbiters will investigate Mercury’s composition, geology, tenuous exosphere and magnetic field, helping scientists understand how the planet formed and evolved so close to the sun.
Operating just tens of millions of miles from the sun, BepiColombo must endure extreme temperatures and intense solar radiation, making it one of the most technically challenging planetary missions ever attempted — and one poised to deliver the most comprehensive view yet of the solar system’s innermost world.
11) China launches the Xuntian space telescope
Xuntian will operate as an ultraviolet-optical observatory in an orbit that allows it to periodically dock with the Tiangong space station for servicing, repairs and upgrades. With an expected minimum 10-year mission, Xuntian’s wide-field survey instruments will map vast regions of the universe, supporting studies of cosmology, dark matter and galaxy evolution, with the potential for mission extensions beyond its initial lifespan.
12) Dream Chaser makes its first orbital flight
Dream Chaser is designed to provide a gentler reentry than capsule-based spacecraft for delivering more delicate scientific experiments and time-sensitive cargo from space. The vehicle is intended to support future cargo resupply missions to the ISS, and, if all goes according to plan, Sierra Space ultimately plans to develop a crewed version capable of carrying astronauts.
13) NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope launches
The space telescope’s primary science goals include studying dark energy, mapping dark matter and discovering thousands of exoplanets via gravitational microlensing, in which a massive foreground object bends the light of a background star, temporarily magnifying it like a lens.
Recently, NASA completed the full assembly of Roman’s major components — joining the spacecraft and telescope segments in its largest clean room at Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland — a major milestone that sets the observatory up for final environmental testing and launch preparations this summer.
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https://www.space.com/space-exploration/moon-landings-asteroid-missions-and-new-telescopes-here-are-the-top-spaceflight-moments-to-look-forward-to-in-2026
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