Solar System Simulator · Spacecraft · live
Where is BepiColombo right now?
Arriving at Mercury: orbit insertion in November 2026. Launched 20 October 2018 by ESA and JAXA.
Worked out for Fri, Oct 23, 2026 (UTC) from JPL Horizons.
What BepiColombo is doing
BepiColombo is two orbiters travelling as one: ESA's Mercury Planetary Orbiter and JAXA's Mio. Reaching Mercury means shedding speed, not gaining it, so the cruise used one Earth flyby, two of Venus and six of Mercury itself, plus long burns of its ion engines.
What happens next
It arrives in November 2026, when the two orbiters separate into their own orbits around Mercury for at least a year of mapping the surface, measuring the magnetic field and probing the planet's oversized iron core.
Timeline
| When | Event |
|---|---|
| 20 Oct 2018 | Launch |
| 10 Apr 2020 | Earth flyby |
| 2020–21 | Two Venus flybys |
| 2021–25 | Six Mercury flybys |
| Nov 2026 | Mercury orbit |
| 2027 | Mapping begins |
What the simulator does
- Open the Now tab: the clock jumps to this minute and pauses, and every probe is drawn where JPL Horizons puts it, among the planets where they really are.
- Pick BepiColombo and the view centres on it; the compressed distance scale keeps even the Voyagers in the frame.
- The positions come from JPL's tables, refreshed every day; the planets come from the simulator's own physics on today's date.
Questions people ask
Where is BepiColombo right now?
BepiColombo is 0.38 AU from the Sun, 57.0 million km (35.4 million mi), and 0.80 AU from Earth. Light from it takes 6.7 minutes to reach us.
How far is BepiColombo from Earth?
0.80 AU, 120.2 million km (74.7 million mi) from Earth today, so a radio signal takes 6.7 minutes each way.
When does BepiColombo arrive at Mercury?
In November 2026, after eight years of flight and nine planetary flybys.
How is its position worked out?
From JPL Horizons, NASA's ephemeris service, which tracks every spacecraft from its radio signals. This site keeps a table of positions a few days apart and reads today's from it; the page is rendered for the day it is served.
Keep going
The distances come from JPL Horizons, refreshed daily; the map and the simulator place the planets with the site's own physics.