Space Exploration
From gunpowder rockets to the outer planets. Space Exploration won a community vote and arrived in Sorting History on 2026-08-16: 109 sortable events from early Chinese rocketry to the 2024 launch of Europa Clipper — Sputnik, Gagarin, Apollo, the Voyagers, Hubble, the Mars rovers and the commercial launch era.
What's in this category
Space Exploration follows the whole story of getting off the planet: rocket pioneers such as Tsiolkovsky and Goddard, the V-2, the space race between the Soviet Union and the United States, crewed orbit and the Moon landings, space stations from Salyut and Skylab to Mir and the ISS, the Space Shuttle years including Challenger and Columbia, planetary probes to every planet, space telescopes, comet and asteroid missions, and the newer programmes from China, Japan, the UAE, Europe and private companies.
What it's not: astronomy discoveries made from the ground mostly live in Scientific Discoveries. Several launches happen in the same year, so expect some close calls — that is where the game gets interesting.
Sample events
- Goddard Launches Liquid Rocket — 1926
- Sputnik 1 Launch — 1957
- Yuri Gagarin Orbits Earth — 1961
- Apollo 11 Moon Landing — 1969
- Voyager 1 Launch — 1977
- Hubble Space Telescope Deployed — 1990
- Curiosity Rover Lands on Mars — 2012
- Europa Clipper Launch — 2024
+ 101 more events. New events added through corrections and ongoing verification.
How to play this category
Premium category, included with Explorer. Explorer and Historian subscribers play it ad-free anytime. Players on the ad-supported tier can unlock it for 1 hour by watching a single rewarded ad. Open Sorting History, tap Play, select Space Exploration, choose a game length, and sort.
