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Space telescope data has underpinned 1.5 million+ scientific papers since 1990.
| Attribute | James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) NASA/ESA/CSA · 🇺🇸 Active · Last updated 2026-06-01Trust: Agency-primaryⓘ Last verified Remove × | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Agency | NASA | NASA/ESA/CSA | NASA |
| Status | In Development | Active | Retired |
| Wavelength band | infrared | infrared | infrared |
| Launch year | 2027 | 2021 | 2003 – 2020 |
| Orbit | Sun-Earth L2 point | Sun-Earth L2 point (~1.5 million km from Earth) | Earth-trailing heliocentric orbit |
| Mirror / aperture | 2.4 mas of [1]Same aperture as Hubble but 100× wider field of view | 6.5 mas of [1]18 gold-coated beryllium hexagonal segments ↑ Largest | 0.85 mas of [1] |
| Mass | ~4,200 kgas of [1]Estimated; uses repurposed NRO mirror donated to NASA | 6,200 kgas of [1]Includes 2,447 kg for the primary mirror assembly ↑ Heaviest | 950 kgas of [1] |
| Wavelength range | 0.48–2.3 μm (optical + NIR) | 0.6–28.5 μm (optical red through mid-IR) | 3.6–160 μm (mid-to-far infrared) |
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| Summary | NASA's next flagship astronomy mission. Roman's 300-megapixel Wide Field Instrument (WFI) has Hubble-equivalent resolution but covers 0.28 square degrees per pointing — 100× wider than Hubble. Its 5-year primary mission will census dark matter, dark energy, and exoplanet populations across the Milky Way. | The most powerful space telescope ever launched. Operating at -233°C at the L2 point, JWST can observe the universe's first light from ~100 million years after the Big Bang. Its first full-color images, released July 2022, immediately set records for the most distant galaxies observed. | NASA's infrared Great Observatory, operating 2003–2020. Best known for discovering the TRAPPIST-1 system of 7 Earth-sized planets, including 3 in the habitable zone (with ground telescopes). Ran out of cryogen in 2009 but continued 'warm mission' until retirement in January 2020. |
All 9 major space telescopes with primary-source citations from NASA, ESA, STScI, and JPL. Pure URL state — bookmark or share the link and the comparison reproduces exactly.