NASA Reworks How Blue Origin and SpaceX Landers Will Reach the Moon, Aiming for a 2028 Landing

NASA said on October 23, 2026, that it and landing-system providers Blue Origin and SpaceX have streamlined their lander designs and changed how both will fly, to support an astronaut landing on the Moon in 2028, according to a NASA release.

The release, titled "NASA, Partners Accelerate Lander Development for 2028 Moon Missions," is on nasa.gov under the Artemis missions section. The release carries no clock time, so this story gives the date only.

What NASA says

NASA says it has redefined Artemis III. The mission now tests rendezvous and docking between test versions of each company's lander and the Orion spacecraft in low Earth orbit next year. Low Earth orbit is the close-in zone where the space station flies. In parallel, NASA says, both companies are building crew and cargo versions of their landers for near-term Artemis missions.

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman put the goal this way: "We are executing President Trump's National Space Policy to complete the long-awaited return of American astronauts to the lunar surface in 2028 and establish a Moon Base."

Crews will launch from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, in Orion, on top of the Space Launch System rocket, NASA says. A commercial lander will link up with Orion. It will then take two crew members to the surface while two stay aboard Orion.

One big change: the landers and Orion will no longer meet in a near-rectilinear halo orbit around the Moon. That is a long, looping path NASA had planned earlier. Instead, each partner gets a meeting orbit that fits its own system.

Two different routes

SpaceX still plans to move super cold liquid propellant between spacecraft in orbit, NASA says. Several Starships launch to low Earth orbit first. NASA compares the tanker Starships to a gas station: they pass propellant to a waiting "depot" Starship, which fuels the Starship lander.

Under the revised plan, the Starship lander waits in Earth orbit for Orion and its crew. They dock there. Then the lander fires its engines to send the linked pair toward low lunar orbit. NASA says it is working to modify Orion so Starship can push it. The crew spends several days on the surface before returning to Orion, according to the release.

NASA says this lowers the propellant Starship must gather in space and shortens the time for astronauts leaving the surface to rejoin Orion. SpaceX will show the propellant approach on its uncrewed demonstration mission.

Blue Origin takes a different path. For the 2028 mission it will put off propellant transfer, NASA says, and use three transfer stages to send its Blue Moon Mark 2 Alpha Lander to the Moon. The stages are based on existing Mark 1 and Mark 2 hardware and work like a multistage rocket, dropping away as their propellant runs out. The stack heads for an elliptical polar orbit around the Moon. Two crew members then descend to the Moon's South Pole.

NASA says that orbit offers faster returns from the surface to Orion, cuts the lander's propellant needs and makes the most of what SLS can deliver.

Contracts and safety checks

Both companies must fly an uncrewed demonstration mission with their crewed landers before the near-term crewed missions, NASA says. NASA will certify the landers before anyone rides them.

The release says NASA updated both contracts earlier this year. Under the original contracts, SpaceX's Starship was assigned to Artemis III and IV, and Blue Origin's Blue Moon Mark 2 to Artemis V. Now both providers take part in Artemis III in low Earth orbit, and neither has been assigned to a specific landing mission.

Both companies added milestones that give NASA a closer look at the work. SpaceX is adding two demonstrations of its crew cabin, called Cabin 1. Blue Origin is adding human-in-the-loop testing, meaning people working with the hardware, plus hardware readiness milestones.

Jeremy Parsons, NASA's Artemis program manager, said the contract updates keep NASA and its partners "on the same page with requirements and other milestones."

One detail from the release: the first surface trips are planned around two Moonwalks of roughly two hours each. Astronauts will collect samples and test the spacesuit supplied by Axiom Space.

Context

The architecture changes were first announced at what NASA calls Ignition Day in March, the release says. CBS News reported that Isaacman laid out the Artemis III change in an interview and news conference, two days after NASA's independent Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel released a report calling the earlier plans too risky. CBS says the panel questioned the number of "firsts" in the original Artemis III landing mission. Isaacman told CBS the new plan addresses points the panel raised, though he said he could not claim they collaborated.

CBS also reported that Isaacman compared the Earth-orbit test to Apollo 9, the 1969 flight that tried out a lander in Earth orbit months before the first landing. Per CBS, that report says NASA plans to fly roughly one mission a year instead of one about every 18 months.

What is next

Artemis III is planned for 2027 in low Earth orbit, NASA says. NASA says it will pick the first company to land astronauts in 2028 based on lander readiness, and a second crewed landing opportunity follows. No lander has yet been assigned to a landing mission. Neither the release nor the CBS report gives a launch date for Artemis III, or a date for either uncrewed demonstration. Those are not in the record yet.

Stay curious.

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