Chronology of the missions to Venus

This list shows in chronological order all space probes that were launched with the aim of reaching the planet Venus . The space probes which did not reach their destination due to malfunctions or other reasons are also mentioned; Probes with pure false starts are in brackets. Some missions to Venus launched and failed by the Soviet Union were designated as satellites (in the case of reaching Earth orbit) and given Sputnik - or Kosmos - cover names. The probes that did not even reach Earth orbit were given no official designation at all. They therefore have names such as: B. Zond 1964A.

chronology

The degree of success is marked in the following colors:

failure	Partial success	Successfully	constantly

No.	Mission (or false start)	Start date ( UTC )	Organization (country)	Results
Contents: 1960 · 1970 · 1980 · 1990 · 2000 · Planned
1960s - 61 - 62 - 64 - 65 - 67 - 69

1.	(Sputnik 7)	4th February 1961	Soviet Union	Planned hard serve on Venus. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher
2.	Venera 1	February 12, 1961	Soviet Union	Planned hard serve on Venus. Contact broke off after just seven days on February 19 at a distance of around two million kilometers from Earth. On May 20, 1961, the probe passed Venus 100,000 km away

3.	(Mariner 1)	July 22, 1962	NASA ( USA )	Planned flyby of Venus. Failed to reach Earth orbit due to failure of the Atlas-Agena launcher
4th	(Sputnik 19)	August 25, 1962	Soviet Union	Planned landing. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher
5.	Mariner 2	August 27, 1962	NASA (USA)	Flew past Venus at a distance of 34,000 km on December 14, 1962. Delivered first measurement data from Venus, which u. a. showed that Venus is not a planet with a warm and humid climate
6th	(Sputnik 20)	September 1, 1962	Soviet Union	Planned landing. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher
7th	(Sputnik 21)	September 12, 1962	Soviet Union	Planned flyby. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher

8th.	(Zond 1964A)	19th February 1964	Soviet Union	Planned engineering test of the space probe, no flight towards Venus. Failed to reach Earth orbit due to failure of the Molnija launcher
9.	(Cosmos 27)	March 27, 1964	Soviet Union	Planned landing. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher
10.	Zone 1	April 2, 1964	Soviet Union	Planned landing on Venus. The radio contact with the probe broke off already on 14 May 1964th On July 14, 1964, the probe passed Venus 100,000 km away

11.	Venera 2	November 12, 1965	Soviet Union	Planned flyby. Contact with the probe broke off shortly before the flyby . On February 27, 1966, the probe passed Venus at a distance of 15,000 miles
12.	Venera 3	November 16, 1965	Soviet Union	Planned landing. Contact with the probe broke off before landing. However, the lander hit the surface of Venus on March 1, 1966 and likely hit hard
13.	(Cosmos 96)	November 23, 1965	Soviet Union	Planned landing. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher

14th	Venera 4	June 12, 1967	Soviet Union	Successful lander, entered the Venusian atmosphere on October 18, 1967. Lander transmitted data on the atmosphere for 96 minutes at an altitude of 15.96 miles, but failed to reach the ground intact
15th	Mariner 5	June 14, 1967	NASA (USA)	Successful flyby on October 19, 1967 at a distance of 3,990 km.
16.	(Cosmos 167)	June 17, 1967	Soviet Union	Planned lander. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher

17th	Venera 5	5th January 1969	Soviet Union	Successful lander, plunged into Venusian atmosphere on May 16, 1969. Lander transmitted data on the atmosphere for 53 minutes but no longer reached the ground intact
18th	Venera 6	January 10, 1969	Soviet Union	Successful lander, plunged into Venusian atmosphere on May 17, 1969. Lander transmitted data on the atmosphere for 51 minutes but no longer reached the ground intact
1970s - 70 - 72 - 73 - 75 - 78

19th	Venera 7	17th August 1970	Soviet Union	Successful lander, entered the atmosphere of Venus on December 15, 1970. Lander transmitted data on the atmosphere for 35 minutes, after landing data was transmitted from the surface for 23 minutes
20th	(Cosmos 359)	22nd August 1970	Soviet Union	Planned lander. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher

21st	Venera 8	March 27, 1972	Soviet Union	Successful lander, plunged into Venus' atmosphere on July 22, 1972 and landed intact on the surface a little later. Lander transmitted data for 50 minutes, but only 11 seconds of data was sent from the surface.
22nd	(Cosmos 482)	March 31, 1972	Soviet Union	Planned lander. Only reached orbit due to failure of the fourth stage of the Molnija launcher

23.	Mariner 10	4th November 1973	NASA (USA)	Mercury probe, flyby of Venus on February 5, 1974 at a distance of 5,800 km. Provided about 4,000 images of Venus

24.	Venera 9	June 8th 1975	Soviet Union	Successful orbiters and lander, Lander landed on October 20, 1975 transmitting data for 53 minutes and, for the first time, some images of the surface to Earth
25th	Venera 10	June 14, 1975	Soviet Union	Successful orbiters and lander, Lander landed on October 25, 1975, transmitting surface data and images to Earth for 63 minutes

26th	Pioneer Venus 1st	May 20, 1978	NASA (USA)	Successful Venus orbiter, entry into Venus orbit on December 4, 1978. Operational until May 1992
27.	Pioneer Venus 2	August 8, 1978	NASA (USA)	Successful atmospheric probes, entry into the Venusian atmosphere on December 9, 1978. The probes transmitted data about the atmosphere during the descent, and one of the four probes unexpectedly survived the landing and provided data from the surface for 67 minutes
28.	Venera 11	September 9, 1978	Soviet Union	Successful flyby and lander; this landed on December 25, 1978 and transmitted data from the surface of Venus for 95 minutes (no camera on board)
29	Venera 12	September 14, 1978	Soviet Union	Successful flyby and lander, lander landed on December 21, 1978 transmitting data from the surface of Venus for 110 minutes (no camera on board)
1980s - 81 - 83 - 84 - 89

30th	Venera 13	October 30, 1981	Soviet Union	Successful flyby and lander, Lander landed on March 1, 1982, transmitting data from Venus' surface for 107 minutes
31.	Venera 14	4th November 1981	Soviet Union	Successful flyby and lander, Lander landed on March 3, 1982, transmitting data from Venus' surface for 57 minutes

32.	Venera 15	June 2nd 1983	Soviet Union	Successful orbiter, reached Venus' orbit on October 10, 1983, and operated well into 1984. Together with Venera 16, mapped about 30% of the surface of Venus with a radar
33.	Venera 16	June 7, 1983	Soviet Union	Successful orbiter, reached Venus' orbit on October 14, 1983 and operated until July 12, 1984. Together with Venera 15, mapped about 30% of the surface of Venus with a radar

34.	Vega 1	15th December 1984	Soviet Union	Flyby, lander and balloon to explore the atmosphere. Landing on June 11, 1985, Lander transmitted data from the surface for 56 minutes. Balloon active for 46.5 hours in the atmosphere. Flyby stage continued to Halley's Comet .
35.	Vega 2	December 21, 1984	Soviet Union	Flyby, lander and balloon to explore the atmosphere. Landing on June 14, 1985, Lander transmitted data from the surface for 57 minutes. Balloon active for 60 hours in the atmosphere. Flyby stage continued to Halley's Comet.

36.	Magellan	May 4th 1989	NASA (USA)	Successful orbiter, reached Venus orbit on August 10, 1990, mapped 98% of Venus' surface with a radar. Burned up on October 12, 1994 in the atmosphere of Venus.
37.	Galileo	October 18, 1989	NASA (USA)	Jupiter probe, a Venus flyby on February 10, 1990 at a distance of 16,000 km, provided 81 images of Venus
2000s - 04 - 05 - 10

39.	Messenger	August 3, 2004	NASA (USA)	Mercury orbiter, two Venus flybys: first on October 24, 2006, second on June 5, 2007

40.	Venus Express	November 9, 2005	ESA (Europe)	Venus orbiter, reached Venus orbit on April 11, 2006 and provided data through the end of 2014. Then the probe burned up in the Venusian atmosphere.

41.	Akatsuki	May 20, 2010	JAXA ( Japan )	Venus orbiter failed to enter orbit on December 8, 2010. A second attempt on December 6, 2015 was successful.
Planned - 2023 - 26

	Shukrayaan-1	2023Template: future / in 3 years	ISRO ( India )	Venus orbiter; Investigation of the atmosphere, ionosphere , surface geology, magnetic field and interplanetary dust

	Venera-D	2026-2031Template: future / in 5 years	Roscosmos ( Russia )	Venus orbiter and lander

Summary

From 1961 to the end of 2010, 36 space probes were launched whose main task was the exploration of Venus: 28 Soviet, six American, one European and one Japanese. Of the missions completed, 20 were successful (15 Soviet and five American); In addition, the European space probe has reached Venus and explored it for eight years. The Japanese probe failed first, but reached a higher than originally planned Venus orbit in December 2015. In addition, two American space probes have so far flown past Venus, whose primary target was another planet, but which also provided images of Venus (Galileo and Messenger.)

Some of the probes launched in the 1960s did not even reach Earth orbit, but this was due to the lack of reliability of the launch vehicles at the time. The success of the Soviet Venus probes was also much better than that of the Mars probes (since 1975 all Soviet Venus missions have been a success), which is partly due to easier landing conditions in the dense atmosphere of Venus.