Pick up to 4 vehicles to compare side-by-side. State lives in the URL — share the link and the comparison loads exactly as you left it. No JavaScript required.
| Attribute | LUPEX (ISRO lander + JAXA rover) Lunar Polar Exploration Mission Trust: Agency-primary Last verified Remove × | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Operator | ISRO | ispace | JAXA + ISRO |
| Prime contractor | ISRO | ispace | JAXA + ISRO |
| Status | In development | Lost | In development |
| Customer | ISRO | private | JAXAISRO |
| Launch date | 2027–2028 (NET) | 2022-12-11 | 2028 (NET) |
| Landing date | — | 2023-04-25 | — |
| Landing site | Near Mons Mouton, lunar south pole | Atlas crater, Mare Frigoris (planned; impacted at altitude ~5 km) | Lunar south pole (permanently shadowed crater margin) |
| Payload | Up to 3 kg lunar sample return (2026-02-06) | Rashid rover (10 kg, UAE/MBRSC) + Sora-Q (0.25 kg, JAXA) + commercial (2023-04-25) | ~350 kg rover with drilling to 1.5 m + ISRO lander (2026-05-28) |
| Contract value | — | — | — |
| Outcome | India's first lunar sample-return mission. Five modules launched on two LVM3 vehicles; requires both Earth-orbit and lunar-orbit docking — first-time capabilities for ISRO. Architecture sanctioned by Government of India September 2024. | Travelled ~1.4M km — at the time, furthest a privately funded spacecraft had flown. Software flagged the radar altimeter as faulty after the lander crossed a crater rim cliff and ignored its readings. Lander ran out of fuel hovering ~5 km above surface and free-fell. | Joint ISRO-JAXA water-ice prospecting mission, designated Chandrayaan-5 by India. India's cabinet approved Phase A on 2025-03-10. Launches on JAXA's H3. Carries American and European instruments alongside Indian and Japanese ones. |
Pure URL state — no JavaScript, no localStorage, no cookies. The comparison renders entirely on the server from the slugs in the query string. Bookmark or share the URL and the comparison reproduces exactly.
Underlying dataset: GET /api/moon/landers. Methodology: /moon/methodology.