Co-founded by Carl Sagan in 1980, The Planetary Society is a member-funded nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing space science and exploration through three core enterprises.

The latest stories from The Planetary Society, featuring humanity's quest to explore worlds, find life, and defend Earth.

They established The Planetary Society to give anyone from anywhere in the world an active role in advancing space exploration. Today, The Planetary Society continues this work, under the …

We connect with planetary exploration experts from around the world to strengthen our work and support international exploration efforts. Our 50,000+ international membership makes us the largest, …

What’s up in the night sky: January 2026 Our monthly feature focuses on easy and fun things to see in the night sky, including eclipses, supermoons, meteor showers, planetary conjunctions, and more.

Jan 9, 2026 · This is our nation’s highest-priority planetary science mission according to the 2023 Planetary Sciences Decadal Survey and is critical to paving the way for eventual exploration of the …

Jan 1, 2026 · Feb. 28: Planetary alignment. Six planets — Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune — will trace an arc across the night sky, though some (Venus, Jupiter, Saturn) will be much …

A NASA team in the 1970s, headed by Planetary Society co-founder Louis Friedman, proposed a solar sail with a surface area of 600,000 square meters (6.5 million square feet), that would be used to …

What is a Planet? It's right there in our name: The Planetary Society. But what is a planet? This seemingly simple question is the subject of much debate. Learn More

Jun 7, 2023 · So, is Earth one in 20 sextillion? Or with that many worlds out there, is it more likely that life has emerged more than once? “Two possibilities exist: either we are alone in the Universe or we …