Voyager 1
What is Voyager 1?
Probes & telescopes· Launched 1977-09-05 – 49th year in flight (interstellar). The most distant human-made object. Launched in 1977, it left the Sun's bubble of influence in 2012 and still moves about 1.5 million km farther away every day.
Mission timeline
- Voyager 1 launch
- Voyager 1 enters interstellar space
- Voyager 1 passes one light-day from Earth(planned)
Spacecraft specs
| Launch | 1977-09-05 |
|---|---|
| Distance | ~172 AU (as of Oct 2026) — farthest human object |
| Speed | 17 km/s (60,000 km/h) |
| Signal delay | ~23.6 h — passes one light-day in Nov 2026 |
| Status | interstellar cruise — a couple of instruments still on |
Figures are representative approximations. Distances that change over time are extrapolated from 2026-07-01. Source: compiled from NASA and IAU public data.
Voyager 1's last photograph and its golden record
In February 1990, at the suggestion of astronomer Carl Sagan, Voyager 1 turned its camera back toward home. From about six billion kilometres away, Earth appeared as a speck of light smaller than a single pixel. The image became famous as the Pale Blue Dot. The cameras were then switched off to save power, so this was the last picture Voyager 1 ever took.
The spacecraft also carries the Golden Record, a 30 cm gold-plated copper disc. It holds greetings in 55 languages, 27 pieces of music, sounds of Earth such as surf and thunder, and 115 images. The cover shows how to play the record and includes a map that locates Earth using 14 pulsars, a kind of star that pulses with a regular beat.
In November 2023 Voyager 1 suddenly began sending back meaningless data. The cause was a single failed memory chip in its computer. With every command taking about 45 hours for the round trip, engineers moved the damaged part of the program into other memory. Engineering data returned in April 2024, and science data followed in June.
The mission in depth
Voyager 1 is a NASA spacecraft launched on 5 September 1977. It flew close past Jupiter in 1979 and Saturn in 1980, photographing both planets and their moons in detail. Each time it passed a planet it borrowed some of that planet's gravity to gain speed, a manoeuvre called a gravity assist. That extra speed was enough to carry it out of the solar system.
In 2012 Voyager 1 left the heliosphere, the giant bubble blown by the stream of particles flowing out from the Sun. Beyond it lies interstellar space, the space between the stars. Proving the crossing was not easy, because the instrument that measured the surrounding gas directly had already failed. Instead, scientists used another instrument to listen as a shock wave from a solar eruption made the surrounding gas ring like a bell, and the pitch of that ringing showed the probe was in interstellar space.
Voyager 1 travels at 17 km/s, fast enough to cross London to Paris in about 20 seconds. It is now so far away that its radio signals take more than 23½ hours to reach Earth. In November 2026 that delay passes 24 hours, making it the first spacecraft a full light-day from home.
The probe's electricity comes from the heat of radioactive material, and the power drops by about 4 watts a year. The team has therefore switched instruments off one by one: the cosmic ray detector in February 2025 and the low-energy charged particle instrument in April 2026. Only the magnetometer and the plasma-wave instrument remain on. NASA aims to keep at least one instrument running into the 2030s, and contact is expected to become impossible around 2036.
Frequently asked
- When did Voyager 1 launch?
- Voyager 1 was launched on 1977-09-05.
- How far is Voyager 1 from Earth?
- The distance of Voyager 1 is ~172 AU (as of Oct 2026) — farthest human object.
- How fast is Voyager 1 travelling?
- The speed of Voyager 1 is 17 km/s (60,000 km/h).
- What is the status of Voyager 1 now?
- As of now, Voyager 1: interstellar cruise — a couple of instruments still on.
- What is the next milestone for Voyager 1?
- Next for Voyager 1, on 18 Nov 2026: Voyager 1 passes one light-day from Earth.
Related
Figures are representative approximations. Simulated positions use J2000 mean elements.