Before the first launch
Rockets existed for centuries before spaceflight. Early rockets were mostly used as fireworks and weapons. In the early 1900s, theorists such as Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in Russia worked out on paper how rockets could reach space, and in 1926 Robert Goddard in the United States launched the first liquid-fueled rocket. During World War II, Germany built the V-2, the first long-range guided rocket. After the war, both the United States and the Soviet Union built on that technology, and much of the early space age grew out of missile programs.
The first satellites (1957-1958)
On October 4, 1957, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik 1, a small metal sphere that circled Earth and broadcast radio beeps. It was the first artificial satellite. A month later Sputnik 2 carried a dog named Laika, the first animal to orbit Earth. The United States launched its first satellite, Explorer 1, on January 31, 1958. Explorer 1 helped reveal belts of charged particles trapped around Earth by its magnetic field. These early launches began what is often called the space race, a competition tied closely to Cold War rivalry.
The first people in space (1961-1965)
Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Union became the first human in space on April 12, 1961, completing one orbit of Earth. Alan Shepard became the first American in space on May 5, 1961, on a short up-and-down flight. John Glenn was the first American to orbit, in 1962. Valentina Tereshkova became the first woman in space in 1963. In March 1965, Alexei Leonov made the first spacewalk.
Robotic explorers reach the Moon and planets
While crews trained, robotic probes began visiting other worlds. The Soviet Luna 2 reached the Moon in 1959, and Luna 9 made the first soft landing there in 1966. Mariner 4 flew past Mars in 1965 and returned the first close-up images of its surface. In 1970, the Soviet Venera 7 transmitted data from the surface of Venus, the first landing on another planet, though only briefly in its extreme heat. The Viking landers touched down on Mars in 1976 and operated for years.
Apollo and the Moon
The best-known chapter is the American Apollo program. Apollo 8 carried astronauts around the Moon in December 1968, the first crewed trip to orbit another world. On July 20, 1969, Apollo 11 landed Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the lunar surface while Michael Collins stayed in orbit. Five more landings followed, the last being Apollo 17 in December 1972. In total, twelve people walked on the Moon. Apollo 13 in 1970 did not land after an onboard explosion, but its crew returned safely. The program also had a tragedy: three astronauts died in a fire during a ground test in 1967. The details of the missions are covered in our explanation of the Apollo missions.
Space stations
Once the Moon race ended, attention turned to staying in orbit longer. The Soviet Salyut 1 became the first space station in 1971. The United States flew Skylab in 1973 and 1974. The Soviet and later Russian station Mir operated from 1986 until 2001. The International Space Station, assembled in orbit by several space agencies starting in 1998, has been continuously occupied by rotating crews since November 2000. Life aboard the space station is a topic of its own.
The Space Shuttle era
The Space Shuttle first flew in 1981 and was the first widely used partly reusable crewed spacecraft. It carried satellites, built the space station and serviced telescopes. Two accidents, Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003, killed all aboard each time, and the fleet was retired in 2011. The shuttle showed both the promise and the difficulty of reuse.
Probes to the outer solar system and beyond
Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 launched in 1977 and used the alignment of the outer planets to visit Jupiter, Saturn and, for Voyager 2, Uranus and Neptune. Voyager 1 entered interstellar space in 2012, making it the most distant human-made object. Later missions went deeper: Galileo orbited Jupiter, Cassini orbited Saturn from 2004 and sent the Huygens probe down to Titan in 2005, and New Horizons flew past Pluto in July 2015. The reasons Pluto is now classed as a dwarf planet are a separate story. Probes have also landed on asteroids and a comet, and sample-return missions have brought bits of asteroids back to Earth.
Telescopes in space
Space-based observatories changed astronomy. The Hubble Space Telescope launched in 1990, and the James Webb Space Telescope launched in December 2021. Looking at faint, distant light from above the atmosphere is explained in our look at how space telescopes see the distant past.
Mars rovers and a new set of players
Robotic rovers on Mars began with the small Sojourner in 1997, followed by Spirit and Opportunity in 2004, Curiosity in 2012 and Perseverance in 2021. China landed a rover on Mars in 2021 and became the first to land on the far side of the Moon in 2019 with Chang’e 4. India landed near the Moon’s south polar region in 2023 with Chandrayaan-3. The field is no longer just two nations: Europe, Japan, India, China and others all run active programs.
Commercial launches and reusable rockets
Since the 2010s, private companies have become major launch providers. A notable change has been reusable first stages that fly back and land, which can lower the cost of reaching orbit. The physics behind getting there is explained in how a rocket reaches orbit. Governments increasingly buy launch services from companies instead of building every rocket themselves.
Where things stand
NASA’s Artemis program aims to return people to the Moon. Its first mission, Artemis I, flew an uncrewed capsule around the Moon in 2022. Schedules for crewed missions and future Mars plans have shifted repeatedly and can be expected to keep changing, so plans should be treated as plans rather than certainties. Beyond crewed flight, robotic missions continue to map planets, study the Sun and look for signs of whether alien life could have existed elsewhere in our own solar system.
A recurring pattern runs through this history. Each stage depended on advances in engineering, materials, computing and funding, and each stage left behind something useful, from weather satellites to global communications. The same technologies also underpin everyday tools like GPS navigation, which relies on satellites in orbit.