Roscosmos (the State Corporation for Space Activities) directs Russia's civil space program and controls much of its state-owned space industry. The present organization is not the Soviet space program under a new name. Russia created a federal space agency on February 25, 1992, after the Soviet Union dissolved, and a 2015 federal law reorganized that agency and a group of manufacturers as a state corporation.[1][2]

Roscosmos operates Soyuz and Progress flights, the Russian segment of the International Space Station, navigation and Earth-observation satellites, and robotic exploration missions. Dmitry Bakanov, appointed director general in February 2025, leads the corporation.[3] Roscosmos also develops launch vehicles and spacecraft through subsidiary enterprises, while Russia's military space operations remain under the country's defense establishment rather than Roscosmos alone.[4]

Status as of August 2026

Roscosmos is flying regular Soyuz and Progress missions and has agreed with NASA to support ISS operations and reciprocal crew-seat exchanges through 2030.[5] Soyuz MS-29 reached the station on July 14 with cosmonauts Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina and NASA astronaut Anil Menon.[6] Russia also flew the first Soyuz-5 development mission in April 2026.[7] The next major projects are less mature: Luna 26 is targeted for 2028, two Luna 27 landers for 2029 and 2030, the first flight of the Orel crew spacecraft for 2028, and the first Russian Orbital Station module for 2028.[8][9][10][39] These are program targets, not completed milestones, and several have moved in earlier schedules.

What Roscosmos controls

The 2015 law gives Roscosmos a combined role that has no direct equivalent at NASA. It acts as the government's manager and regulator for civil space activity while also controlling an industrial group that designs and manufactures rockets, spacecraft, instruments, and ground equipment.[1] Roscosmos is therefore not a single design bureau. A mission bearing its name may involve several separately managed enterprises.

OrganizationPrincipal responsibilities in the civil program
RSC EnergiaSoyuz and Progress spacecraft, operation of the ISS Russian segment, and development work for the Russian Orbital Station and Orel
Progress Rocket Space CentreSoyuz-2 and Soyuz-5 launch vehicles, plus Resurs-P Earth-observation spacecraft
Khrunichev CenterProton and Angara launch vehicles and the Briz-M upper stage
NPO LavochkinRobotic planetary and astrophysics spacecraft, including the Luna series, and Fregat upper stages
ReshetnevGLONASS navigation spacecraft and communications and data-relay satellites
TsENKICivil spaceport infrastructure, launch preparation, and ground services

Official material from Roscosmos identifies Energia, Progress, Khrunichev, Lavochkin, Reshetnev, and TsENKI as parts of this industrial network.[11] The companies' own program listings make the division of work clearer: Progress lists Soyuz-2, Soyuz-5, and Resurs-P among its products; Lavochkin describes planetary spacecraft and Fregat as core activities; and Reshetnev identifies GLONASS-K as a satellite developed under Roscosmos.[12][13][14]

This division also explains why "Roscosmos" can mean different things in reporting. The corporation sets and administers civil programs, a lead enterprise performs system engineering, other companies build major subsystems, and the Ministry of Defence can be the customer for a launch or satellite. An Oxford Handbook analysis notes that the Russian Aerospace Forces, rather than Roscosmos, manage military space activity and Plesetsk Cosmodrome.[4]

Human spaceflight and launch vehicles receive more public attention, but satellite services are a large part of Roscosmos's operational work. Its public service portal groups the GLONASS navigation system, Gonets messaging satellites, Luch data-relay satellites, Earth remote sensing, and the Russian contribution to the international COSPAS-SARSAT search-and-rescue system alongside the ISS.[15]

GLONASS provides global positioning, navigation, and timing. Reshetnev builds the principal spacecraft series; the company reported in February 2026 that five GLONASS-K satellites were operating in the wider GLONASS fleet and that those spacecraft also relayed emergency beacon signals for COSPAS-SARSAT.[14] That number describes the newer K model, not the size of the entire multi-generation constellation.

The Earth-observation fleet serves several different jobs rather than a single imaging mission. Resurs-P4 and P5 provide high-resolution land imagery, Kondor-FKA uses radar that can observe through cloud and darkness, Meteor-M supports meteorology, Elektro-L observes weather from geostationary orbit, and Arktika-M provides high-latitude weather coverage. The international Committee on Earth Observation Satellites listed those series as operational in its 2026 agency inventory.[16] The World Meteorological Organization separately records Resurs-P4 as an operational Roscosmos high-resolution land-observation satellite and identifies the instruments used for panchromatic, multispectral, and hyperspectral imaging.[17]

Soviet heritage and the modern corporation

Roscosmos inherited organizations, hardware lineages, facilities, and technical experience from the Soviet program, but not a single centralized Soviet agency. The Soviet Union's design bureaus and ministries launched Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite, on October 4, 1957. Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space aboard Vostok 1 on April 12, 1961, Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space in 1963, and Alexei Leonov conducted the first spacewalk in 1965. These milestones defined the early Space Race.[18]

Soviet robotic probes also achieved the first successful soft landing on the Moon with Luna 9 in 1966 and the first robotic lunar sample return with Luna 16 in 1970.[41] After the United States won the race to a crewed lunar landing, the Soviet program placed greater emphasis on long-duration stations. Salyut 1 became the first space station in 1971, and the modular Mir station operated from 1986 until 2001.[19] Physician-cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov's 437-day Mir flight remains the record for one continuous human spaceflight.[20]

The R-7 rocket that launched Sputnik also began the engineering lineage that led to the modern Soyuz launcher. That continuity is real, but it should not obscure the institutional changes after 1991: the Russian agency was reorganized several times before the 2015 state-corporation model consolidated management and much of the industry.[1][2]

Soyuz and the ISS partnership

Russia joined the International Space Station partnership in the 1990s. A Proton rocket launched Zarya, the station's first on-orbit element, from Baikonur on November 20, 1998. Zarya was Russian-built but funded and owned by the United States, an important detail in a program built around interdependent contributions.[21] The Russian segment now relies on Soyuz spacecraft for crews, Progress vehicles for cargo and propulsive reboosts, and modules led operationally by RSC Energia.[22]

Soyuz became the only way to carry people to and from the ISS after the Space Shuttle retired in 2011 and remained so until Crew Dragon began operational service in 2020. Russian crews also continued the Soviet program's long-duration experience. Oleg Kononenko returned from his fifth mission in September 2024 with 1,111 cumulative days in space, the highest total for any person.[23]

Crew rotations continued through a serious ground-infrastructure interruption. A service platform at Baikonur's Site 31 was damaged after the Soyuz MS-28 launch in November 2025. Repairs were completed in March 2026, allowing Progress and then crewed missions to resume.[24] Soyuz MS-29 launched from the restored complex in July, while the MS-28 crew returned to Kazakhstan on July 26 after 241 days in orbit.[6][25]

The ISS has remained an exception to the wider breakdown in Russian-Western space cooperation since Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Under the seat-exchange arrangement, NASA astronauts fly on Soyuz while Roscosmos cosmonauts fly on American Commercial Crew Program missions. Andrey Fedyaev flew on SpaceX's Crew-12 in February 2026, and Sergey Teteryatnikov is assigned to Crew-13.[26][27] Roscosmos and NASA said in July 2026 that station operations and the exchange would continue through 2030.[5]

Luna 25 and robotic exploration

Luna 25 was Russia's first lunar mission since Luna 24 in 1976. It launched from Vostochny in August 2023 and entered lunar orbit, but a maneuver intended to lower that orbit ran too long. Roscosmos's investigation found that an accelerometer block did not switch on, preventing the control system from detecting when the required velocity change had been reached. The engine ran for 127 seconds instead of the planned 84, placing the spacecraft on a collision trajectory with the Moon.[28]

The loss delayed a lunar program that was already running well behind earlier schedules. The Russian Academy of Sciences later placed Luna 26, a polar orbiter, in 2028.[8] Luna 27 is now described as two landers, one targeted for 2029 and the other for 2030. The pair is intended to visit the north and south polar regions, but the academy official who announced the dates said their order had not been determined.[9] These dates remain targets. They have not yet been demonstrated by completed spacecraft or launch campaigns.

The 2022 rupture with Europe also changed the program. The European Space Agency suspended cooperation with Roscosmos on the ExoMars rover after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, and Soyuz missions scheduled from Europe's spaceport in French Guiana were put on hold.[29] Roscosmos has continued lunar planning with China's CNSA through the International Lunar Research Station initiative. Russia is among the participating countries, and Russian plasma and particle instruments were selected for China's planned Chang'e 8 precursor mission.[42]

Launch vehicles

Roscosmos's active launcher portfolio spans the long-established Soyuz-2 and Proton-M, the modular Angara family, and the new Soyuz-5 development program.

RocketStatus in August 2026Main role
Soyuz-2OperationalCrews, Progress cargo, and satellites
Proton-MOperational but approaching retirementHeavy payloads from Baikonur
Angara 1.2 and A5Operational at a low flight rateLight and heavy government payloads
Soyuz-5Flight development after an April 2026 testMedium-lift launcher based at Baikonur

The Soyuz-2 is built by Progress Rocket Space Centre and remains Russia's principal orbital launcher.[12] Khrunichev developed Angara to replace Proton with a modular family manufactured in Russia. The heavy Angara A5 first launched from Vostochny in April 2024 and has also flown from Plesetsk.[30]

Soyuz-5, developed with infrastructure cooperation from Kazakhstan, made its first test flight from Baikonur on April 30, 2026. It flew a suborbital trajectory with a mass simulator rather than placing an operational payload in orbit.[7] Published specifications put its planned low Earth orbit capacity at about 17 tonnes.[31] Roscosmos announced a second flight for the second half of 2027 and a third for 2028, so the vehicle should still be described as being in flight development rather than operational service.[32]

Constraints, funding, and launch cadence

Russia's space sector entered the 2020s with an aging launcher portfolio and a much smaller commercial share than it had held in the Proton and Soyuz export era. Sanctions after 2014 restricted access to some technologies, and the 2022 invasion ended major European partnerships and most Western launch business. A peer-reviewed 2023 analysis describes the combined effects of institutional reorganization, external economic pressure, technology access, and the break in international cooperation.[33] The change can also be seen directly in ESA's cancellation of ExoMars cooperation and withdrawal of Soyuz from Europe's spaceport.[29]

Russia made 17 orbital launch attempts in 2024 and 17 in 2025. Jonathan McDowell's annual statistical review counted 181 attempts by the United States and 92 by China in 2025, showing how far Russia's launch cadence now sits below the two most active launching states.[34] Through early August 2026, Russia had made 11 launch attempts, including the Soyuz-5 development flight.[35] These national totals include military as well as civil missions and should not be read as Roscosmos commercial launches alone.

The Russian government approved a new national space project intended to run from 2026 through 2036. Public announcements described more than one trillion rubles for the first three years and about 4.4 to 4.5 trillion rubles through 2036.[36][37] Those figures are long-range program allocations, not evidence that every proposed mission is fully funded or will hold its announced schedule.

Program roadmap

Roscosmos's published roadmap is concentrated in the late 2020s. Dates in this table are the latest public targets available in August 2026, not guarantees.

TargetProgram milestoneEvidence and maturity
2027, second halfSecond Soyuz-5 development flightAnnounced after the first test; vehicle remains in flight development[32]
2028Luna 26 polar orbiterRussian Academy of Sciences target after multiple delays[8]
2028First Orel crew-spacecraft flightRoscosmos management target; no crewed flight is yet scheduled[10]
2028First Russian Orbital Station moduleUpdated 2026 Roscosmos target; Energia is lead developer[38][39]
2029 and 2030Two Luna 27 landers, one for each lunar poleAcademy planning dates; pole order is undecided[9]
2030End of planned ISS operations and seat exchangeJoint NASA-Roscosmos operating horizon announced in July 2026[5]
By 2034Full Russian Orbital Station deploymentSchedule stated by the station's chief designer in April 2026[39]

The Russian Orbital Station schedule has already changed. An approved 2024 plan placed launch of the first science and power module in 2027. By April 2026, Roscosmos said the first module was expected in 2028, while the station's chief designer placed full deployment in 2034.[38][39] Energia's general designer also said that deployment within the ISS Russian segment depends on decisions by the other station partners.[40] The exact assembly sequence and relationship to existing ISS modules therefore remain unsettled.

References

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  2. What is the Roscosmos State Corporation for Space Activities? - The Planetary Society.
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  4. Russia's Integrated Statecraft in the Space Domain - Oxford Handbook of Space Security, February 2024.
  5. Russia Agrees to ISS Operations, Seat-Swaps, Through 2030 - SpacePolicyOnline, July 2026.
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  7. Russia's new homegrown Soyuz 5 rocket aces debut launch - Space.com, May 2026.
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