SpaceX is likely to fall behind schedule in landing NASA astronauts on the Moon by mid-2027. According to an internal SpaceX document obtained by Politico, NASA’s Artemis-3 Moon landing mission may get delayed to September 2028, pushing back humanity’s return to the lunar surface by more than a year. The delay is likely to result from critical tests that SpaceX will be conducting on its Starship rocket, which has been contracted by NASA for crewed Moon landings.
SpaceX is building the world’s biggest rocket Starship to fulfill NASA’s lunar ambitions and its own objective of establishing colonies on Mars.
According to the document, Politico reported that SpaceX wants to achieve in-orbit refueling and an uncrewed lunar landing of Starship before crewed missions. NASA’s plan is to use Starship, parked in the lunar orbit, to take astronauts to the Moon after they switch vehicles from the Orion spacecraft.
The in-orbit refueling is reportedly targeted for June 2026 and the uncrewed landing for June 2027. This means, the Artemis-3 landing could be possible only if SpaceX achieves the milestones on schedule.
Starship has flown 11 times so far on near-orbital flights but the progress has been slow. In 2025, it launched five times and three of them were only partially successful as the upper stage was lost either in space or during re-entry. For refueling, SpaceX will transfer propellant from one Starship rocket into another while in space. According to Space.com, Starship will need to be fueled 12 times to complete its journey to the Moon and back.
SpaceX’s new tentative schedule for HLS, per internal document I obtained:
– Prop transfer June 2026
– Uncrewed lunar landing June 2027
– Crewed lunar landing Sept 2028First in POLITICO Pro space newsletter👇 pic.twitter.com/AY5O9vFACv
— Audrey Decker (@audrey_decker9) November 14, 2025
Politico reports that SpaceX is likely to present the new timeline in an “integrated master schedule” that it will handover to NASA in December.
This is not the first time the Moon mission has been delayed by a year. In December 2024, NASA announced that it is postponing the Artemis 3 mission from 2026 to mid-2027. It was originally supposed to launch in 2024 but has been deferred three times since then.
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The delays have also affected Artemis 2, the crewed mission with four astronauts that involves orbiting the Moon to test the Orion spacecraft. Artemis 2 is targeted for launch no later than April 2026, although some reports say NASA may launch it as early as February.
The latest news highlights concerns of industry experts who are worried Starship could hold back NASA in its lunar race against China. Acting NASA administrator Sean Duffy said in October that the agency is looking for options other than SpaceX, which was awarded a contract worth $2.9 billion but keeps lagging behind schedule.
“They push their timelines out, and we’re in a race against China,” Duffy reportedly told CNBC. “So, I’m going to open up the contract. I’m going to let other space companies compete with SpaceX.” One other company is Jeff Bezos-owned Blue Origin, which already has $3.4 billion in funding to build a Human Landing System.
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