Future Observatories
The great space observatories of the coming decades — dark energy, habitable worlds, gravitational waves, and the X-ray sky.
- AthenaMission conceptUnder study · In reformulation; launch envisaged in the late 2030s
ESA's next great X-ray observatory — designed to study the hot, energetic universe, from the gas that binds galaxy clusters to the black holes that shaped galaxies, at far higher sensitivity than today's X-ray telescopes.
- Habitable Worlds ObservatoryMission conceptUnder study · In early design; launch envisaged in the 2040s
NASA's next flagship space telescope, recommended by the astronomy decadal survey — designed to directly image potentially habitable planets around other stars and search their atmospheres for signs of life.
- LISAMission conceptIn development · Launch planned in the mid-2030s
A space-based gravitational-wave observatory — three spacecraft forming a giant laser interferometer to hear the low-frequency ripples in spacetime that ground detectors cannot, from the mergers of the largest black holes.
Already in development or en route
These missions are already first-class entities in the graph — explore each on its page.