Elon Musk has long said settling Mars is SpaceX’s raison d’être, but the world’s richest man has now pivoted his attention to the moon. The company is targeting an uncrewed lunar landing in March 2027 and has ambitions to create a “self-growing city” on our nearest celestial neighbor.
The news marks a dramatic shift from Musk’s long-standing goal of a permanent human presence on the red planet, which he has framed as a way to hedge humanity’s future against a cataclysmic event on Earth. Only a year ago the billionaire labeled missions to the moon “a distraction.”
But in a surprise announcement posted to X on Super Bowl Sunday, Musk revealed the change in strategy, confirming a Wall Street Journal report earlier in the week that SpaceX was putting off plans for a Mars mission to focus on lunar landings instead.
“For those unaware, SpaceX has already shifted focus to building a self-growing city on the Moon, as we can potentially achieve that in less than 10 years, whereas Mars would take 20+ years,” wrote Musk. “The mission of SpaceX remains the same: extend consciousness and life as we know it to the stars.”
The practical advantages of this shift are clear. As Musk notes, Mars is only accessible when the planets align every 26 months, with each journey taking six months (or longer). Trips to the moon can launch every 10 days and would take just a few days to arrive.
Lunar landings are also a problem SpaceX already needs to solve. The company has a $4 billion contract with NASA to return astronauts to the moon using its Starship rocket. The Artemis III mission will attempt to land a crew on the moon in 2028, though it’s unclear whether SpaceX’s vehicle will be ready in time.
However, the pivot to the moon appears to be about more than just pragmatism. Musk has become increasingly focused on artificial intelligence and, in recent months, has suggested this mission may overlap with his space ventures. In particular, he has floated the idea that space-based data centers may help solve the energy constraints currently holding back AI development.
Last week, Musk put his money where his mouth is by announcing that SpaceX had acquired his AI company xAI in a merger valuing the new entity at a whopping $1.25 trillion. In comments at an all-hands meeting at xAI on Tuesday evening, heard by the The New York Times, Musk unveiled an ambitious vision for how the company could build a factory for AI data centers on the moon’s surface.
The plan includes a giant electromagnetic catapult called a “mass driver” to launch satellites from the lunar surface into space. He also described building “a self-sustaining city on the moon,” which could act as a stepping stone to Mars.
The pivot may also be in response to growing competition from Jeff Bezos, his chief rival in the private space race. The billionaire’s rocket company, Blue Origin, has finally started to deliver with its New Glenn launch vehicle, and sources told Ars Technica that Bezos wants his team to go “all in” on lunar exploration.
Crucially, Blue Origin is developing a crew transportation system that doesn’t require orbital refueling. SpaceX’s Starship, on the other hand, will require around 10 to 12 tanker flights to fill the vehicle with propellant before it sets off on a lunar mission, according to Space.com.
While Starship has a major payload advantage—more than 100 tons to the lunar surface—the relative simplicity of Blue Origin’s technology could allow it to land humans on the moon before its rival.
Despite the refocus on the moon, Musk insisted he hasn’t abandoned Mars. In his Sunday post, he emphasized that SpaceX still has plans to build a city on the red planet and missions to start this process will begin in five to seven years.
Given Musk’s record for overly ambitious timelines, his prognostications on both the moon and Mars should probably be taken with a pinch of salt. Nonetheless, it seems increasingly likely that humanity’s first off-Earth settlement will be a lot closer to home than we thought.
