The journey to L2
Roman launched on 30 August 2026 at 11:26 UTC on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy from LC-39A at Kennedy Space Center, and set off on a transfer of about 100 days to the Sun-Earth L2 point, 1.5 million km from Earth. The solar arrays, high-gain antenna and deployable aperture cover are all deployed, both science instruments have been powered on, and on 22 October 2026 the observatory began its final, science commissioning phase. Arrival in orbit around L2 is planned for early December 2026. The live view above shows its real-time distance and journey progress.
Hubble’s field of view, times one hundred
Roman pairs a 2.4-metre mirror, the same diameter as Hubble’s, with the 300.8-megapixel Wide Field Instrument covering 0.281 square degrees per exposure: roughly 100 times Hubble’s infrared field of view at the same sharpness, surveying the sky around 1,000 times faster. A coronagraph technology demonstration will also directly image mature giant exoplanets by suppressing starlight to part-per-billion levels with deformable mirrors.
Dark energy and a census of worlds
Roman’s core surveys target two of the biggest open questions in astrophysics. Wide-area and time-domain surveys will map hundreds of millions of galaxy shapes and thousands of Type Ia supernovae to measure how dark energy has driven cosmic expansion. Towards the centre of the Milky Way, its microlensing survey is expected to add tens of thousands of exoplanets, including cold, distant worlds no other technique can find. Every observation is public from day one, and first science images are expected in early 2027.