Companies: Blue Origin and Sierra Space
Capacity: 10 crew to start (extendable)
Volume: 830 cubic meters to start (extendable)
Start of Service: 2027
The Orbital Reef team will develop a first of its kind "mixed use business park" in space. Blue Origin and Sierra Space are working with Boeing, Redwire Space, Genesis Engineering Solutions and Arizona State University on the project.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Northrop Grumman
Capacity: 4 crew to start (extendable)
Volume: Not disclosed (extendable)
Start of Service: Not disclosed
The concept will use elements from Northrop Grumman's flight-proven Cygnus spacecraft and its Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO) already in production. Northrop Grumman is working with Dynetics and others on the project.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Axiom Space
Capacity: 4 crew to start (extendable)
Volume: Not disclosed (extendable)
Start of Service: AxH1 module (2024)
The "Axiom Segment" of at least 4 modules attached to the Harmony Node of the ISS will separate and become a standalone "Axiom Station" when the ISS is retired sometime around 2030. More modules may be added later.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Orbital Assembly
Capacity: 440 people
Volume: Over 125,000 square feet of habitable space at 1/6 G
Start of Service: Not disclosed
This ambitious Von Braun style station will rotate to create artificial gravity in an outer ring that is planned to have 24 habitation modules that include luxury villas, dining and entertainment.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Nanoracks
Capacity: The first Outposts will likely be unmanned test-beds for space experiments.
Volume: 54 cu m
Start of Service: 2024
Nanoracks will use Mission Extension Kits (MEK)s to take control of the spent upper stages of rockets and turn them into Outposts. The first Outpost will launch on ULA Vulcan rocket and utilize its spent Centaur stage. Future Outposts may be manufactured in space out of previously spent upper stage canisters that currently clutter low Earth orbit. The recent Outpost Mars Demo-1 mission demonstrated in-space metal cutting, which is needed to manufacture Outposts in orbit out of such space junk.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Companies: Nanoracks, Voyager Space and Lockheed Martin
Capacity: 4 crew to start (extendable)
Volume: 340 cubic meters to start (extendable)
Start of Service: 2027
The basic elements for Starlab will include a large inflatable habitat, a docking node, power and propulsion, a large robotic arm and the George Washington Carver (GWC) science park.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Orbital Assembly
Capacity: 28 crew
Volume: 2,080 cubic meters
Start of Service: As soon as 2025
The mixed-use Pioneer-class station will feature spacious microgravity modules and a rotating "Gravity Ring" and will be the precursor to the much larger Voyager-class station.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Virgin Galactic
Launch Vehicle: VMS Eve (air launch)
Capability: Suborbital 80-90 km above Earth
Time in Space: Several minutes
Capacity: 8 crew (2 pilots)
Price Per Ticket: $450,000
1st Mission (Completed): Unity 22 (July 11, 2021)
1st Destination: 86 kilometer apogee
1st Crew: David Mackay (pilot), Michael Masucci (pilot), Sir Richard Branson, Beth Moses, Colin Bennett and Sirisha Bandla
Next Mission: Q2 2023
Unity 22 was technically a test flight with no paying customers onboard. However, Sir Richard Branson made his long-awaited first flight to the edge of space, and this was the Virgin Galactic's first fully crewed spaceflight. Commercial service is expected to officially start in early 2023.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Axiom Space
Transport Vehicle: Crew Dragon (SpaceX)
Launch Vehicle: Falcon 9 (SpaceX)
Capability: Low Earth orbit
Time in Space: 1-2 weeks
Capacity: 4 crew
Price Per Ticket: Not disclosed. $55,000,000 (reported)
1st Mission (Completed): AX-1 (April 8-25, 2022)
1st Destination: Docked with ISS in orbit 410 km above Earth
1st Crew: Michael López-Alegría (commander), Larry Connor (pilot), Mark Pathy, Etyan Stibbe
Next Mission: AX-2 (Spring 2023)
Next Destination: To dock with ISS in orbit 410 km about Earth
Next Crew: Peggy Whitson (commander), John Shoffner (pilot) and 2 others
Axiom is taking tourists to the ISS right now, but the company plans to own and operate its own space station for science and tourism in the future.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Blue Origin
Launch Vehicle: New Shepard
Capability: Suborbital more than 100 km above Earth
Time in Space: Several minutes
Capacity: 6 crew
Price Per Ticket: Not disclosed. $1.25 million (reported)
1st Mission (Completed): NS-16 (July 20, 2021)
1st Destination: 107 kilometer apogee
1st Crew: Jeff Bezos, Mark Bezos, Wally Funk, and Oliver Daemen
Next Mission: Not Scheduled
Blue Origin had launched 6 successful crewed New Shepard missions and was launching private astronauts regularly before the uncrewed NS-23 mission failed on September 12, 2022. New Shepard is currently grounded pending review of the incident.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: SpaceX
Launch Vehicle: Falcon 9
Capability: Low Earth orbit
Time in Space: 3-6 days
Capacity: 2-4 crew
Price Per Ticket: Not disclosed. Jared Isaacman reportedly committed $100 million to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital as part of paying for the entire orbital trip of Inspiration4.
1st Mission (Completed): Inspiration4 (September 15-18, 2021)
1st Destination: In orbit 575 km above Earth
1st Crew: Jared Isaacman (commander), Hayley Arceneaux, Chris Sembroski, Dr. Sian Proctor
Next Mission: Polaris Dawn (Spring 2023)
Next Destination: In orbit about 700 km above Earth
Next Crew: Jared Isaacman (commander), Scott Potent (pilot), Sarah Gillis, Anna Menon
The next orbital mission of Crew Dragon will be the first of three missions bought by Isaacman, which includes a possible mission to the Hubble Space Telescope and the first crewed Starship mission, which have not been scheduled
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: SpaceX
Launch Vehicle: Starship Super Heavy
Capability: Deep space
Time in Space: About 1 week
Capacity: Up to 12
Price Per Ticket: Not disclosed. Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa reportedly picked up the entire tab for the dearMoon mission, but the price he paid was not disclosed
1st Mission: dearMoon. A planned 2023 launch is likely to be postponed as Starship is being developed
1st Destination: Around the Moon 384,400 km from Earth
1st Crew: Yusaku Maezawa (crew leader), Steve Aoki, Choi Seung Hyun, Yemi A.D., Rhiannon Adam, Tim Dodd, Karim Iliya, Brendan Hall, Dev D. Joshi, Kaitlyn Farrington (backup crew), Miyu (backup crew)
2nd Mission: 2nd Moon flyby (date TBD)
2nd Destination: Around the Moon 384,400 km from Earth
2nd Crew: Space tourism pioneer Dennis Tito and his wife bought two seats. 10 additional seats are still available
*Last updated December 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Sierra Space
Launch Vehicle: Vulcan (ULA)
Capability: Low Earth orbit
Time in Space: Several days or more
Capacity: 7 crew
Price Per Ticket: Not disclosed
1st Mission: Not scheduled
Dream Chaser is expected to start shuttling cargo to and from the ISS in 2023 with a crewed version ready by 2025.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Astrobotic
Launch Vehicle: Vulcan Centaur (ULA)
Capacity: 120 kg of cargo
1st Launch: PM1 (Q1 2023)
1st Moon Landing: At Lacus Mortis (Q1 2023)
1st Cargo: NASA and commercial payloads including time capsules and Colmena, a group of swarming rovers from Mexico. Payloads from 7 different countries.
*Last updated November 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Intuitive Machines
Launch Vehicle: Falcon 9 (SpaceX)
Capacity: 130 kg of cargo
1st Launch: IM-1 (Spring 2023)
1st Moon Landing: At South Pole (Spring 2023)
1st Cargo: NASA and commercial payloads including a lunar observatory test camera and a technology demonstration from Columbia Sportswear
2nd Launch: IM-2 (2023)
*Last updated November 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Firefly Aerospace
Launch Vehicle: Falcon 9 (SpaceX)
Capacity: 155 kg of cargo
1st Launch: Mission 1 (2024)
1st Moon Landing: Mare Crisium (2024)
1st Payloads: 10 NASA payloads plus unspecified commercial payloads
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: SpaceX
Launch Vehicle: Starship Super Heavy
Capacity: 100 tons of cargo
1st Launch: Artemis III (2025)
1st Moon Landing: Lunar South Pole (2025)
1st Crew: NASA will use Starship Human Landing System (HLS) to land 4 astronauts on the Moon, including the first woman and the first person of color on the Moon, during its Artemis III mission tentatively set for 2025.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: ispace, inc.
Launch Vehicle: Falcon 9 (SpaceX)
Capacity: 30 kg of cargo
1st Launch: Mission 1 (November 30, 2022)
1st Moon Landing: At Atlas Crater (April 2023)
1st Cargo: Includes the Rashid rover, UAE's first rover and a rover from Japan
2nd Launch: Mission 2 (2024)
*Last updated November 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Astrobotic
Launch Vehicle: Falcon Heavy (SpaceX)
Capacity: 500 kg of cargo
1st Launch: GM1 (2024)
1st Moon Landing: Lunar South Pole (2024)
1st Cargo: NASA VIPER Rover
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: SpaceX
Launch Vehicle: Starship Super Heavy
Launch: Late 2020s
Arrival: Late 2020s
Elon Musk has said he wants to colonize Mars with 1 million people by 2050.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Companies: Impulse Space and Relativity
Launch Vehicle: Terran R (Relativity)
Launch: Late 2024
Arrival: Early 2025
The plan is to launch the Impulse Lander on a testflight of Relativity's Terran R rocket.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: SpaceFab
Transfer Vehicle: Starship rideshare (proposed)
Launch: Late 2020s
Destination: 16 Psyche
Arrival: Early 2030s
SpaceFab wants to send a probe based on its proposed Viewpoint satellite to 16 Psyche, a resource-rich rock in the asteroid belt. The probe would collect a small amount of material from the asteroid and return it to Earth.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: TransAstra
Launch Vehicle: Medium lift
Launch: Mid 2020s
Destination: Near Earth asteroid
Honey Bee will be capable of extracting up to 100 tons of water (about half the amount needed to fill a backyard swimming pool) from asteroids that are as big as a house.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: TransAstra
Launch Vehicle: Super Heavy lift
Launch: Very Late 2020s to Early 2030s
Destination: Near Earth asteroid
Queen Bee will be capable of capturing and extracting up to thousands of tons of water from 50-meter asteroids.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
Company: Rocket Lab
Launch Vehicle: Electron
Launch: May 2023
Destination: Clouds of Venus
Arrival: October 2023
Rocket Lab in partnership with MIT plans to send a Photon spacecraft to Venus to search for organic chemicals in the clouds and signs of life before crashing into the surface of the planet. This would be the first private mission to Venus.
*Last updated October 2022. Dates and details may change.
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Oct. 24, 2020 - The early explorers knew it. Anything and everything can be repurposed for all sorts of useful things when you're in a strange place far from home. For a while, we forgot it. Or, for the sake of speed, simply ignored that part of the pioneer's handbook in the race for firsts in the final frontier. Now, we're remembering sustained settlement of any frontier requires creative reuse. ...
June 7, 2021 - If it were up to Derek Harris, the affable Business Operations Manager for Scotland rocket-maker, Skyrora, he'd launch beer and haggis; put that proper exclamation point on the upcoming demonstration flight for Skyrora XL. "But I think the boss would kill me for that," he said, chuckling.
Ah. Maybe it's for the best. Why waste perfectly good meat pudding? And will there even be room?
The demonstration flight for Skyrora's flagship Skyrora XL rocket, scheduled to shoot something into orbit ...
Sept. 29, 2020 - It's not sleek and curvy like a SpaceX Starship. It's got no billionaire backer with deep pockets and spare cars to shoot into deep space. It's not even guaranteed headlines on all of the space blogs. But in 2021, a small delivery Moon lander called Peregrine from Pittsburgh may just become...
December 26, 2020 - Fueled by friendly competition, led by ambitious space pros and backed by the checkbook of the United States government, a fledgling Moon industry is starting to form. The next phase of space development is finally here. Humans are about to settle another world.
NASA hopes to return people to the Moon by the middle of the decade; this time to stay. And a new crop of private space companies is poised...
January 25, 2021 - Everyone likes an underdog. Especially one with a friendly smile and Bob Marley hair. But it's not just the reggae-loving sheepdog mascot that makes it easy to root for Team Puli from Hungary. It's the setbacks suffered and the team's persistence...
April 3, 2021 - The "NewSpace" trifecta. A single company up and running on three different worlds. No matter how tiny the toehold, it seems like that should be a pretty significant moment for a space startup of this era. Like one of those defining moments that ultimately leads to humanity's complete dominion over the entire solar system. Kind of like...
November 29, 2022 - What a month, Moon fans!
Artemis 1, NASA's uncrewed test flight for returning humans to the Moon later on this decade, thundered off the launchpad in mid November after months of disappointing delays. Its Orion craft has already sent back some tantalizing pics from its lunar flyby.
Just before that...
Nov. 27, 2020 - It's one of the biggest and most valuable rocks tumbling around the asteroid belt. Some people say the amount of metal in the exposed core of 16 Psyche is worth more than the entire economy of Planet Earth. There may even be gold there. ...
October 27, 2022 - "So, just for a little bit of fun..." I said in the middle of my hour-long sit-down with Joel Sercel, PhD, the visionary CEO and founder of space mining company, TransAstra. "Maybe fifty, sixty years down the road, you're the Rockefeller slash Andrew Carnegie of space mining resources...
November 22, 2022 - "That was exhilarating!" I said to my wife after the 6th episode of ANDOR. And I don't say stuff like that out loud. It was also my version of a thank you, which I don't say nearly enough. ...
December 18, 2022 - I have to confess. I don't look up at the stars nearly enough. My telescope gathers dust in the corner of our home. Far too much of my gazing is done on YouTube and Twitter for iPhone these days.
I am a space blogger, a wannabe outer space magazine chief editor (a confession for another day). Yet, I can count on exactly one finger how many times I've wandered out into the wilderness specifically to look up at the stars. ...