List of missions to the Moon


List of missions to the Moon


As part of human exploration of the Moon, numerous space missions have been undertaken to study Earth's natural satellite. Of the Moon landings, Luna 2 of the Soviet Union was the first spacecraft to reach its surface successfully, intentionally impacting the Moon on 14 September 1959. In 1966, Luna 9 became the first spacecraft to achieve a controlled soft landing, while Luna 10 became the first mission to enter orbit, and in 1968 Zond 5 became the first mission to carry lifeforms (tortoises) to close proximity of the Moon.

Between 1968 and 1972, crewed missions to the Moon were conducted by the United States as part of the Apollo program. Apollo 8 was the first crewed mission to enter orbit in December 1968, and it was followed by Apollo 10 in May 1969. Six missions landed humans on the Moon, beginning with Apollo 11 in July 1969, during which Neil Armstrong became the first person to walk on the Moon. Apollo 13 was intended to land; however, it was restricted to a flyby due to a malfunction aboard the spacecraft. All ten crewed missions returned safely to the Earth.

While the United States focused on the crewed Apollo program, the Soviet Union conducted uncrewed missions that deployed rovers and returned samples to the Earth. Three rover missions were launched, of which two were successful, and eleven sample return flights were attempted with three successes.

Missions to the Moon have been conducted by the following nations and organisations (in chronological order): the Soviet Union, the United States, Japan, the European Space Agency, China, India, Luxembourg, Israel, Italy, South Korea, the United Arab Emirates, Russia, Mexico, and Pakistan. The Moon has also been visited by five spacecraft not dedicated to studying it; four spacecraft have flown past it to gain gravity assistance, and a radio telescope, Explorer 49, was placed into selenocentric orbit in order to use the Moon to block interference from terrestrial radio sources.

20th century

Legend

⚀ Cubesat or similar

21st century

Legend

⚀ Cubesat or similar

Statistics

Launches by decade

This is a list of 142 missions (including failed ones) to the Moon. It includes Flybys, Impact probes, orbiters, landers, rovers and crewed missions.

Mission milestone by country

This is a list of major milestones achieved by country. Recorded is the first spacecraft from each respective country to accomplish each milestone, to regardless of mission type or intended outcome. For example, Beresheet was not intended to be an impactor, but achieved that milestone incidentally.

Legend

  Milestone achieved
  Milestone not achieved
† First to achieve

Missions by organization/company

Future missions

There are several future lunar missions planned or proposed by various nations and organisations.

Funded and are under development

Robotic

Crewed

Proposed but full funding still unclear

Robotic

The following robotic space probe missions have been proposed but their full funding is unclear:

Unrealized concepts

1960s

  • Soviet crewed lunar programs – The Soviet Union had been pursuing a crewed lunar flyby mission using Soyuz 7K-L1 launched aboard Proton-K and a crewed landing mission using Soyuz 7K-LOK and LK Lander launched aboard N1 rocket. After a series of N1 failures, both of these programs were cancelled in 1970 and 1976 respectively.

1970s

  • Canceled Apollo missions – The Apollo program had three more missions lined up until Apollo 20, but the missions beyond Apollo 17, the sixth and final landing mission, were canceled due to budget constraints, change in technical direction and hardware delays. The ambitions shifted towards developing next generation rockets like Space Shuttle, the space station Skylab and in exploration programs such as Grand Tour program.

2000s

  • Constellation Program – The Constellation program ran from 2004–2010 and would have utilised the Ares I and Ares V rockets alongside the Orion spacecraft and Altair lunar lander to return astronauts to the Moon by 2020 in preperation for crewed missions to Mars. Cancelled in October 2010 by the Augustine Committee, though Orion was spared and finally launched in November 2022 with Constellation and its rockets revised as the Artemis Program and Space Launch System.

2010s

  • Resource Prospector – Concept by NASA of a rover that would have performed a survey expedition on a polar region of the Moon. It was canceled in April 2018.
  • Indo-Russian joint mission – A joint mission between India and Russia for a robotic lander and rover was under development since 2007. Russia was supposed to develop the lander while India would develop an orbiter, a rover and launch the composite. However, with failure of Fobos-Grunt mission, Russia was unable to provide the lander in time and requested India to accept the delay and risk. The collaboration ended with India repurposing its orbiter towards Mars with its Mars Orbiter Mission in 2013.

2020s

  • DearMoon was an unrealized tourist mission financed by Japanese entrepreneur Yusaku Maezawa. Maezawa and six to eight other civilians would have performed a lunar flyby in a SpaceX Starship. It was cancelled on June 1, 2024
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See also

  • List of extraterrestrial orbiters
    • List of artificial objects on the Moon
    • List of lunar probes
  • List of missions to Mars
  • List of missions to Venus
  • List of missions to the outer planets
  • Timeline of Solar System exploration
  • List of rovers on extraterrestrial bodies
  • Moon landing

Notes

References

External links

  • Interactive map of many of the successful Moon landings to date

Text submitted to CC-BY-SA license. Source: List of missions to the Moon by Wikipedia (Historical)



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