NASA announced that the earliest launch window for Artemis II is Feb. 6, 2026, with 12 more possible dates available from February-April. The Artemis mission, a followup to the Apollo program, hopes to have astronauts back on the moon’s surface by 2027.

NASA has confirmed the upcoming milestones for its historic Artemis II mission—the first crewed flight of the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft, sending four astronauts on a lunar flyby for the first time in over 50 years—with rollout and Wet Dress Rehearsal (WDR) to set the stage for a potential launch in February.

NASA announced it is preparing to roll out the Artemis II rocket and Orion spacecraft from the Vehicle Assembly Building to Launch Pad 39B at Kennedy Space Center no earlier than Jan. 17, marking a major milestone toward the first crewed mission of the Artemis program.

NASA could be sending a crew on the Orion spacecraft out past the moon in less than a month if everything falls into place. But first the agency has to get its rocket to the launch pad. That could as early as next Saturday when the mobile launcher topped with the Space Launch System rocket and Orion could make the four-mile slow roll atop the crawler-transporter 2 from the Vehicle Assembly

SLS and the Orion spacecraft are fully stacked together inside NASA’s Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy Space Center. Once final tests are complete, the launch vehicle will be rolled out onto the pad at Launch Complex-39A, which should take about 10 hours.

NASA’s plans to launch astronauts to the moon in early 2026. The Artemis II mission is expected to carry a crew around the moon — though not to the lunar surface.

Advocates for space science research are concerned about job losses and cuts to funding at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville. Marshall has lost about 350 people through the deferred resignation program established by the Trump administration as part of its cuts to federal agencies,