Click the Brandenburg Flag for a German translation Für eine deutsche Übersetzung dieser Seite einfach die Brandenburger Flagge anklicken

Jupiter A collection of pictures of the planet Jupiter taken from the planet's orbit.

On October 18, 1989, NASA's Galileo probe was launched from the space shuttle Atlantis. On December 8, 1995, Galileo became the first probe to orbit Jupiter. Galileo stayed in orbit for almost eight years. The most famous pictures of the mission were those of Jupiter's moons. On August 5, 2011 NASA launched the Juno spacecraft, which was inserted into a polar orbit on July 5, 2016 and has delivered stunning pictures ever since. Artist’s concept of Juno in Jupiter's orbit. Source: Johns Hopkins APL

Galileo encountered a problem with its High Gain Antenna which caused massive problems for the graphics-sensitive weather monitoring (Source: JTG). As far as photography is concerned, the probe is therefor best remembered for its stunning images of Jupiter's moons.

Io July 3, 1999

Europa September 7, 1996

Ganymede January 18, 1999

Callisto August 22, 2001

Our collection of pictures of Jupiter's moons starts at the next page. Ever since Juno entered orbit, the world has been receiving stunning images of unprecedented resolution. Here are our favorites.

Chaotic Clouds of Jupiter June 21, 2018 Source: NASA

Tumultuous Clouds of Jupiter May 29, 2019 Source: JPL / NASA

Jupiter Abyss May 29, 2019 Source: JPL / NASA

Colors on the Wind, September 11, 2019 Source: JPL / NASA	Storm on the Horizon, July 20, 2019 Source: JPL / NASA

Jupiter Spiral February 12, 2019 Source: JPL / NASA

Two Massive Storms December 21, 2018 Source: JPL / NASA

Jupiter Blues October 24, 2017 Source: NASA

Cropped image of the closest approach Source: Newsweek

July 11, 2017 Source: NASA

July 11, 2017 Source: vox.com / NASA

July 11, 2017 Source: vox.com / NASA

On July 10, 2017, Juno flew just 9,000 km (5,600 miles) above Jupiter’s most recognizable feature: the Great Red Spot and delivered the closest view at this centuries old storm to date (pictures above) Recently, Juno's mission has been extended until 2021. Eventually, like the Galileo probe before, Juno will be directed towards the planet and will burn up in its atmosphere to avoid accidental contamination of Jupiter's moons. Due to its polar orbit, Juno also took the first closeup pictures of the planet's polar regions (pictures right).

South Pole Mosaic of images taken in 2017 Source: NASA / Planetary Society

North Pole Mosaic of images taken in 2017 Source: NASA / Planetary Society

At the latest count, Jupiter has 79 known moons. Several spacecraft delivered high resolution pictures of the four Galilean moons Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. We devoted extra pages to each of the four large moons, starting with Io.

Click here to return to Jupiter flyby pictures

Click here to move on to Jupiter's moon Io

Back to Solar System Page

Back to Space Page

Back to English Main Page

Back to Start Page