The complete guide to Artemis

Humans are going back to the Moon, and this time the plan is to stay. The Artemis program flew astronauts around the Moon in April 2026 for the first time since 1972, and the first landing of the program is planned for 2028. The destination changed in 2026 as well: NASA paused the Gateway station in lunar orbit and shifted its near-term architecture toward a proposed Moon Base at the south pole. This guide connects everything on the wiki about how the pieces fit together.

Why return to the Moon at all

Three reasons dominate. Science: the lunar south pole holds water ice in permanently shadowed craters, a record of solar system history and a potential resource for propellant and life support. Strategy: the Space Race instincts of the 1960s never fully went away, and China is working toward crewed lunar landings by 2030. The China Manned Space Agency reported in February 2026 that tests of the Long March 10 rocket, the Mengzhou capsule, and the Lanyue lander were running on schedule, and on July 10, 2026 the first stage of a Long March 10B was caught in a net aboard a recovery ship 430 kilometers downrange, making China the second country to recover an orbital-class booster. Practice: the Moon is three days from home, which makes it the place to test habitats, suits, and rovers before committing crews to multi-year Mars missions.

The hardware, in one paragraph each

The Space Launch System is the expendable heavy rocket that starts every crewed mission; it has flown twice, both successes, and NASA cancelled its planned Block 1B and Block 2 upgrades in February 2026 to contain cost and schedule risk. Orion is the crew capsule on top, with a European-built service module that earns ESA astronauts seats on later flights. The landers are commercial, and there are two of them: NASA awarded SpaceX 2.89 billion dollars in 2021 for a lunar version of Starship, then added Blue Origin's Blue Moon MK2 under a 3.4 billion dollar contract in 2023. Crews will wear a lunar suit built by Axiom Space. Robotic cargo flies separately on commercial landers through the CLPS program, which has been delivering payloads to the surface since 2024; two more attempts are on the manifest for later in 2026, Firefly's Blue Ghost Mission 2 to the lunar far side and Intuitive Machines' IM-3 to the Reiner Gamma swirl.

The missions so far

Artemis I (November 2022) sent an uncrewed Orion around the Moon for 25.5 days and exposed a heat shield issue that took over a year to resolve. Artemis II (April 1-10, 2026) carried Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch, and Jeremy Hansen on a free-return flyby, setting a record for the farthest humans have ever traveled from Earth: 406,771 km. Glover became the first Black astronaut to fly to the Moon, Koch the first woman, and Hansen the first Canadian. Over ten days the crew covered 695,081 miles, took more than 7,000 photographs including terrain near the candidate south pole landing sites, and sent high-definition video home by laser. Orion splashed down off San Diego on April 10, and NASA's initial assessments found the spacecraft performed as expected.

What happens next

NASA reshaped Artemis III in February 2026 and named its crew on June 9: commander Randy Bresnik, pilot Luca Parmitano of ESA, and mission specialists Frank Rubio and Andre Douglas, with Bob Hines as backup. Rather than attempting a landing, the roughly two-week mission will stay in Earth orbit in 2027 and dock Orion with lander test articles, about two days with Blue Origin's and about a day with a Starship pathfinder, to prove the interfaces the landing missions need. Artemis IV in 2028 is planned as the first crewed landing, at the lunar south pole, and NASA has deliberately not chosen its lander: the agency intends to decide after watching both perform on Artemis III. Both dates depend on hardware that is still maturing. Starship needs orbital refueling, and Blue Origin is rebuilding after a New Glenn booster exploded during a static fire on May 28, 2026, destroying the rocket and heavily damaging its only orbital launch pad. Blue Origin traced the blast to a main oxygen valve on a BE-4 engine in early August 2026 and is targeting a return to flight before the end of the year.

The open questions

Three things to watch. Orbital propellant transfer: the Starship lander cannot reach the Moon without it, it has never been demonstrated, and SpaceX says it aims to attempt a transfer before the end of 2026. The shape of the program itself: NASA paused Gateway in its current form on March 24, 2026, issued a stop-work order the following month, and redirected near-term planning toward a three-phase Moon Base at the lunar south pole. NASA has not published a complete, funded construction schedule, and its goal of landings about every six months remains a plan rather than an achieved cadence. Hardware and technology developed for Gateway's HALO module are being repurposed: in August 2026 NASA and Northrop Grumman agreed to use them in three Lunar Infrastructure Demo missions that will test surface power, thermal control, autonomy, and communications through the lunar night. And budgets generally: NASA's fiscal 2026 appropriation landed at 24.44 billion dollars, but SLS and Orion's long-term future remains an open debate in Washington, where the White House proposed ending both after Artemis III while a July 2025 reconciliation law appropriated 4.1 billion dollars specifically to keep building SLS vehicles for Artemis IV and V.

Frequently asked questions

When will humans land on the Moon again?

Under the plan as of August 2026, Artemis IV in 2028 is the first crewed landing, at the lunar south pole. Artemis III in 2027 stays in Earth orbit to dock Orion with lander test articles, and NASA intends to choose between SpaceX's Starship and Blue Origin's Blue Moon for the landing only after seeing how both perform.

How is Artemis different from Apollo?

Apollo was a race with disposable hardware and equatorial landing sites; Artemis targets the resource-rich south pole with commercial, partially reusable landers and international partners, and since March 2026 its stated goal is a permanent base on the surface rather than a station in lunar orbit. See the full Apollo vs Artemis comparison.

What happened to the Gateway station?

NASA paused Gateway in its current form on March 24, 2026 and issued a stop-work order the following month. Its HALO habitation module had fallen years behind schedule and needed repairs for corrosion found in its primary structure, and the agency decided crews will transfer directly from Orion to their landers instead. In August 2026 NASA and Northrop Grumman agreed to reuse HALO technology in three robotic demonstration missions supporting the planned surface base.

Why does the lander need refueling in orbit?

The Starship lander is so large that it launches with nearly empty tanks and must be filled by tanker flights in Earth orbit before heading to the Moon. Cryogenic propellant transfer at this scale is unproven, which makes it one of the program's biggest technical risks. Artemis III will test docking a Starship article with Orion in Earth orbit, but NASA's later lunar architecture still requires a fueled lander to be positioned for Orion before the crew arrives.

Who pays for all this?

Congress appropriated 24.44 billion dollars for NASA in fiscal 2026, and Artemis is funded within that. The agency buys landers and cargo delivery as fixed-price commercial services while owning SLS and Orion outright. International partners contribute hardware, like Orion's European service module, in exchange for crew seats.