ISRO has sent spacecraft to the Moon three times, to Mars once and to the Sun–Earth L1 point once, and built India's own navigation system, NavIC. Each journey below follows one mission from launch to arrival and beyond — every engine burn, every setback and what came of it.
Mars · launched 5 Nov 2013 on PSLV · Mission complete · 2014–2022. Mangalyaan, ISRO's Mars Orbiter Mission, launched on 5 November 2013 and entered orbit around Mars on 24 September 2014 — making India the first country to reach Mars orbit on its first attempt. Designed to last six months, it worked for about eight years before contact was lost in 2022.
Moon · launched 22 Oct 2008 on PSLV · Ended early · found water. Chandrayaan-1 launched on 22 October 2008 and orbited the Moon for 312 days, completing more than 3,400 orbits. It dropped India's flag onto the lunar surface with the Moon Impact Probe and carried the instrument that found water molecules on the Moon — before contact was lost on 29 August 2009.
Moon · launched 22 Jul 2019 on LVM3 · Orbiter working · lander lost. Chandrayaan-2 launched on 22 July 2019 with an orbiter, the Vikram lander and the Pragyan rover. The orbiter reached the Moon and is still working; Vikram descended normally to 2.1 km above the surface before contact was lost and it crash-landed. Four years later, Chandrayaan-3 applied every lesson — and landed.
Sun–Earth L1 · launched 2 Sep 2023 on PSLV · Operating. Aditya-L1 launched on 2 September 2023 and reached a halo orbit around the Sun–Earth L1 point, about 1.5 million km from Earth, on 6 January 2024. From there it watches the Sun without interruption, studying the corona, solar flares and the solar wind with seven instruments.
Geosynchronous orbit · launched 1 Jul 2013 on PSLV · 3 satellites navigating · NVS-03 heading to its slot. NavIC (Navigation with Indian Constellation) is India's regional satellite navigation system, built so India and the area 1,500 km around it need not depend on GPS. ISRO completed a seven-satellite constellation in 2016 — then imported atomic clocks began to fail, a replacement was lost on launch, and a second-generation satellite was stranded in 2025. This is how it is being rebuilt.
Low Earth orbit · Human spaceflight · in development · G1 uncrewed flight targeted Q4 2026 · crewed 2027. Gaganyaan (Sanskrit for "sky vehicle") is ISRO's human spaceflight programme: an Indian capsule on an Indian rocket carrying up to three astronauts to a 400 km orbit and back. Approved in 2018, it has been built test by test — re-entry capsules, abort tests, parachute drops — towards the uncrewed G1 flight, targeted for late 2026, and a crewed flight in 2027.
Three. Chandrayaan-1 (2008) orbited the Moon and found water molecules; Chandrayaan-2 (2019) put an orbiter in lunar orbit but its lander crashed; Chandrayaan-3 (2023) landed near the lunar south pole.
Chandrayaan-1, Chandrayaan-2 and Chandrayaan-3 went to the Moon, Mangalyaan (the Mars Orbiter Mission) went to Mars, and Aditya-L1 went to the Sun–Earth L1 point about 1.5 million km away. Mangalyaan and Aditya-L1 are the only two to have left Earth's sphere of influence.
Gaganyaan, India's human spaceflight programme. Its first uncrewed flight, G1, carrying the Vyommitra robot, is targeted for the fourth quarter of 2026, and the first crewed flight for 2027. The Gaganyaan journey page tells the story from 2007 to today; the Gaganyaan tracker has the latest launch status.
Related: ISRO missions timeline, ISRO rockets, next ISRO launch.