LEO to Lunar Surface: Corridor Detail

Corridor record

The Fields Every Corridor Carries

The same fields open every corridor detail page.

From: LEO
To: Lunar surface
Δv: 5.90 km/s
Transit: 3-5 days direct; 3-4 months by ballistic lunar transfer
Gear ratio: 30.7× on LOX/methane, from Earth's surface
Window: Daily departures; lighting limits south-pole arrivals within each month
Light time: 1.3 s one way
Carries: Crew, landers, and anything not made locally
Status: Flown
Retired: No
Rated: Observed

Δv budget

5.9 km/s in Three Burns

Through a 100 km lunar parking orbit, as Apollo and Chang'e-5 flew it.

Δv by leg
Leg	Δv	Flown by	Rated
LEO → trans-lunar injection	3.15 km/s	Apollo S-IVB stage; Long March 5 upper stage on Chang'e-5	Observed
Lunar orbit insertion, 100 km	0.85 km/s	Apollo service module; Chang'e-5 orbiter	Observed
Descent and landing	1.90 km/s	Apollo lunar module descent stage; Chang'e 7,500 N variable-thrust engine	Observed
Total	5.90 km/s	Direct descent without a parking orbit costs about the same	Observed

Artemis stages through a near-rectilinear halo orbit (NRHO): cheaper to reach from Earth, about 2.5-2.7 km/s from NRHO down to the surface. Depots and staging orbits are on Cislunar Space.

Who has flown it

28 Landings by Six Operators Since 1966

The firsts, then the totals by program. Landing sites and what each mission found are on The Moon.

Firsts on the LEO → Lunar surface corridor
Mission	Operator	Year	First	Rated
Luna 9	USSR	1966	First soft landing	Observed
Apollo 11	NASA	1969	First crew; six crewed landings through Apollo 17, 1972	Observed
Luna 16	USSR	1970	First robotic sample return	Observed
Chang'e-3	CNSA	2013	First landing since Luna 24 in 1976	Observed
Chang'e-4	CNSA	2019	First far-side landing	Observed
Chandrayaan-3	ISRO	2023	First landing near the south pole	Observed
IM-1 Odysseus	Intuitive Machines	2024	First commercial landing; tipped on touchdown	Observed
Chang'e-6	CNSA	2024	First far-side sample return	Observed

Successful landings by program
Program	Landings	Years	Notes	Rated
USSR, Luna program	8	1966-1976	Three sample returns; Lunokhod 1 and 2 rovers	Observed
NASA, Surveyor and Apollo	11	1966-1972	Five Surveyors; six Apollo crews	Observed
CNSA, Chang'e	4	2013-2024	Two rovers; two sample returns	Observed
ISRO, Chandrayaan	1	2023	Chandrayaan-2 lander lost in 2019	Observed
JAXA, SLIM	1	2024	Landed on its nose; still operated	Observed
Commercial, CLPS	3	2024-2025	IM-1, IM-2 and Blue Ghost Mission 1; both IM landers tipped	Observed

Failed attempts left out of the totals: Beresheet (SpaceIL, 2019), Hakuto-R Mission 1 (ispace, 2023), Luna 25 (Roscosmos, 2023) and Resilience (ispace, 2025).

Who flies it next

Six Landers in Development, Two Crew Programs

The US Artemis landers and China's crewed program both use this corridor.

Vehicles in development
Vehicle	Operator	Role	Rated
Starship HLS	SpaceX	Crew lander for Artemis III; refilled in LEO	Building
Blue Moon MK1	Blue Origin	Cargo lander	Building
Blue Moon MK2	Blue Origin	Crew lander for Artemis V	Building
Lanyue and Mengzhou on Long March 10	CMSA	Crewed landing before 2030	Building
Chang'e-7	CNSA	South-pole ice survey; launch postponed 24 August 2026	Building
Chang'e-8	CNSA	Resource-use demonstration ahead of ILRS	Building

Program detail is on Artemis and Chinese Program Structure.

Gear ratio

Every Ton on the Surface Costs About 30.7 Tons Launched

Rocket equation for the full 5.90 km/s from LEO, dry mass fraction 0.10, times the 5.2× Earth-to-LEO launch factor.

Gear ratio by propulsion class
Propulsion	Isp	Mass ratio	Gear ratio	Rated
Storable, MMH/NTO	320 s	6.55	37.9×	Observed
Methane, LOX/CH₄	360 s	5.32	30.7×	Observed
Hydrogen, LOX/LH₂	450 s	3.81	22.0×	Observed
Nuclear thermal to lunar orbit, hydrogen to land	900 s, 450 s	2.42	14.0×	Modeled

Landing needs high thrust, so nuclear electric propulsion can carry only the in-space legs. Water, oxygen and structure made on the Moon each replace that many tons of launch; whether making them beats shipping is the Ship-or-Make Threshold. The mass driver that sends material the other way is on The Moon.

Time and windows

Three Days, Any Day

The Moon is the only surface destination with a continuous launch window.

Apollo crews took about three days each way. Cargo can trade time for propellant on a ballistic lunar transfer: Korea's Danuri and NASA's CAPSTONE both took about four months in 2022 and saved on lunar orbit insertion.

Light time is 1.3 seconds each way, so surface machines can be teleoperated with lag - see Launch Windows & Cadence for the destinations where that stops being true.

China

Half the Landings Since 1976 Are Chinese

Four Chang'e landers, two relays and a crewed lander in development.

Chinese programs on this corridor
Program	Data point	Rated
Chang'e-3 to Chang'e-6 · CNSA	Four landings, 2013-2024, on Long March 3B and Long March 5	Observed
Queqiao-1 and Queqiao-2 · CNSA	Relays at EML-2 and in lunar frozen orbit; make far-side landings possible	Observed
Lanyue lander · CMSA	Crewed lander; Lanyue and Mengzhou launch separately on Long March 10 and dock in lunar orbit	Building
ILRS · CNSA and Roscosmos	South-pole base; nuclear power station delivery 2035	Projected

Contested

Deliberately Not Claimed

The load-bearing uncertainties, tagged with the confidence they actually earn.

Modeled

The gear ratio ignores refilling. Starship HLS reaches the Moon after several tanker flights refill it in LEO. Refilling changes how many launches the corridor takes, not the mass ratio of the route.