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A Mars rover is a remote-controlled motor vehicle designed to travel on the surface of Mars. Rovers have several advantages over stationary landers: they examine more territory, they can be directed to interesting features, they can place themselves in sunny positions to weather winter months, and they can advance the knowledge of how to perform very remote robotic vehicle control. They serve a different purpose than orbital spacecraft like Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. A more recent development is the Mars helicopter.
The planet Mars has been explored remotely by spacecraft. Probes sent from Earth, beginning in the late 20th century, have yielded a large increase in knowledge about the Martian system, focused primarily on understanding its geology and habitability potential. Engineering interplanetary journeys is complicated and the exploration of Mars has experienced a high failure rate, especially the early attempts. Roughly sixty percent of all spacecraft destined for Mars failed before completing their missions, with some failing before their observations could even begin. Some missions have been met with unexpected success, such as the twin Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, which operated for years beyond their specification.
ExoMars is an astrobiology programme of the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Russian space agency (Roscosmos).
A Mars sample-return (MSR) mission is a proposed mission to collect rock and dust samples on Mars and return them to Earth. Such a mission would allow more extensive analysis than that allowed by onboard sensors.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to space exploration.
The idea of sending humans to Mars has been the subject of aerospace engineering and scientific studies since the late 1940s as part of the broader exploration of Mars. Long-term proposals have included sending settlers and terraforming the planet. Proposals for human missions to Mars have come from agencies such as NASA, CNSA, the European Space Agency, Boeing, and SpaceX. Currently, only robotic landers and rovers have been on Mars. The farthest humans have been beyond Earth is the Moon, under the Apollo program.
A Mars landing is a landing of a spacecraft on the surface of Mars. Of multiple attempted Mars landings by robotic, uncrewed spacecraft, ten have had successful soft landings. There have also been studies for a possible human mission to Mars including a landing, but none have been attempted. Soviet Union’s Mars 3, which landed in 1971, was the first successful Mars landing. As of 2023, the Soviet Union, United States and China have conducted Mars landings successfully.
Yinghuo-1 was a Chinese Mars-exploration space probe, intended to be the first Chinese planetary space probe and the first Chinese spacecraft to orbit Mars. It was launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, on 8 November 2011, along with the Russian Fobos-Grunt sample return spacecraft, which was intended to visit Mars' moon Phobos. The 115-kg (250-lb) Yinghuo-1 probe was intended by the CNSA to orbit Mars for about two years, studying the planet's surface, atmosphere, ionosphere and magnetic field. Shortly after launch, Fobos-Grunt was expected to perform two burns to depart Earth orbit bound for Mars. However, these burns did not take place, leaving both probes stranded in orbit. On 17 November 2011, CNSA reported that Yinghuo-1 had been declared lost. After a period of orbital decay, Yinghuo-1 and Fobos-Grunt underwent destructive re-entry on 15 January 2012, finally disintegrating over the Pacific Ocean.
A Mars flyby is a movement of spacecraft passing in the vicinity of the planet Mars, but not entering orbit or landing on it. Uncrewed space probes have used this method to collect data on Mars, as opposed to orbiting or landing. A spacecraft designed for a flyby is also known as a "flyby bus" or "flyby spacecraft".
Tianwen-1 Chinese: 天问一号 is an interplanetary mission by the China National Space Administration (CNSA) which sent a robotic spacecraft to Mars, consisting of 6 spacecraft: an orbiter, two deployable cameras, lander, remote camera, and the Zhurong rover. The spacecraft, with a total mass of nearly five tons, is one of the heaviest probes launched to Mars and carries 14 scientific instruments. It is the first in a series of planned missions undertaken by CNSA as part of its Planetary Exploration of China program.
Tianwen-4, formerly known as Gan De, is a planned interplanetary mission by China to study the Jovian system and its environs, sharing a launch with a spacecraft which will make a flyby of Uranus.
Zhurong is a Chinese rover on Mars, the country's first to land on another planet after it previously landed two rovers on the Moon. The rover is part of the Tianwen-1 mission to Mars conducted by the China National Space Administration (CNSA).
The Planetary Exploration of China, also known as Tianwen, is the robotic interplanetary spaceflight program conducted by the China National Space Administration (CNSA). The program aims to explore planets of the Solar System, starting from Mars, and will be expanded to Jupiter and more in the future.
Tianwen-3 is a planned Mars sample-return mission by China which would send two spacecraft via two separate launches to Mars. Together, the two spacecraft will seek to obtain samples of Martian rocks and soil and then return the cached samples to Earth.