Starship Finally Passed Its Orbital Test. Here Is Where the Moon and Mars Programs Actually Stand.

SpaceX's Starship completed its sixth integrated flight test on January 16, 2026 — the first in the program's history to achieve a full orbital trajectory, re-entry through peak heating, and controlled ocean splashdown of both the Super Heavy booster and the Ship upper stage. The technical milestone took three years and five failed or partial test flights to reach. It was a milestone NASA had been waiting for, because Starship is the designated Human Landing System for Artemis III: the mission that will return Americans to the lunar surface for the first time since December 1972.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson confirmed in a February 4 statement that the agency considers the January test "sufficient to proceed with the next phase of Starship qualification" for the Artemis III role. That next phase — an uncrewed propellant transfer demonstration in low Earth orbit — is the technically demanding operation that stands between Starship's current state and a crewed lunar landing. The architecture NASA has approved requires multiple propellant-transfer flights to fill Starship's tanks in orbit before it descends to the lunar surface. That operation has never been conducted in a crewed mission context, and it requires a precision rendezvous and docking sequence that SpaceX has not publicly demonstrated at scale.