A Chinese reusable suborbital spacecraft built to support low-cost research and future space tourism has successfully completed a key test flight, marking another milestone in the rapid expansion of the country’s commercial space sector.

China has submitted filings covering plans for more than 200,000 satellites to the International Telecommunication Union, signaling an aggressive move to secure orbital positions and radio spectrum as global competition in low Earth orbit (LEO) accelerates.

NASA has outlined its near-term roadmap toward the launch of Artemis 2, providing long-awaited clarity on rollout plans, testing milestones, and potential launch windows for the mission that will carry astronauts beyond Earth orbit for the first time in more than five decades.

India’s first orbital launch of 2026 ended unsuccessfully after a malfunction struck the third stage of the Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle, marking a second consecutive failure for the country’s long-reliable workhorse rocket.

NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) could return to Earth as early as Thursday following a medical situation that prompted mission managers to shorten their stay in orbit, the U.S. space agency announced.

For space enthusiasts, SpaceX is usually experienced through spectacular launches, synchronized booster landings, and ambitious talk of Mars. Yet beneath the visuals lies a financial structure that is just as transformative as the technology itself. The story of SpaceX’s money is inseparable from the story of Elon Musk’s fortune, because the company’s strategy, risk appetite, and long-term goals are tightly bound to how Musk has chosen to build and deploy his wealth.

NASA engineers are continuing efforts to reestablish communications with the agency’s MAVEN spacecraft, a long-running Mars orbiter that has played a key role in understanding how the Red Planet lost much of its atmosphere. Contact with MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN) was lost on Dec. 6, and recovery attempts to date have not been successful.

Cape Canaveral, Florida — December 16, 2025 — In the early hours of Tuesday morning, a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V 551 rocket lifted off from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, carrying 27 new satellites for Amazon Leo, the e-commerce giant’s burgeoning low Earth orbit (LEO) broadband satellite network. 

Rocket Lab’s bid to close out 2025 with a rapid-fire trio of Electron launches hit a brief pause early Monday, after the company aborted one of its missions moments before liftoff when onboard systems detected an anomaly.

A new peer-reviewed study published in Nature has issued one of the strongest warnings yet about the growing impact of satellite megaconstellations on the low Earth orbit (LEO) environment and the future of astronomical research. With companies such as SpaceX, Amazon, and OneWeb—and national governments including those of the United States and China—pushing ahead with plans for fleets of hundreds to tens of thousands of satellites, scientists say the consequences for space-based and ground-based observations could be profound.

Rocket Lab is preparing to expand its role in the global launch market, announcing the successful completion of final qualification tests for the innovative fairing that will top its upcoming Neutron rocket. The partially reusable launch vehicle, built to challenge SpaceX’s Falcon 9 in medium-lift missions, is slated to make its debut flight early next year.

NASA astronaut Jonny Kim and two Russian cosmonauts returned to Earth early Tuesday, landing on the frozen steppe of Kazakhstan after an eight-month mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Their Soyuz MS-27/73S spacecraft touched down at 12:03 a.m. EST (0503 UTC; 10:03 a.m. local time), ending a mission that spanned nearly 4,000 orbits and more than 104 million miles traveled.