NASA Picks Relativity Space for Mars Mission: What It Means

NASA announced on June 17, 2026 that it has partnered with Relativity Space, a Los Angeles-based rocket company, to build and operate the spacecraft and launcher for an upcoming Mars science mission. This is the clearest sign yet that NASA believes the eight-year-old startup is ready to handle tasks beyond simply launching small satellites — it now trusts the company to manage complex interplanetary operations.

The deal follows a model NASA has used since its Commercial Crew program: NASA specifies what it needs and provides the scientific instruments, while a private company handles the engineering and day-to-day operations. What makes this partnership unusual is that Relativity Space built its entire reputation around 3D printing. Rather than using 3D printing as a quick way to test ideas, the company has made it the foundation of how it manufactures rockets.

From a Milestone to Deep Space

Relativity proved it could reach orbit in March 2023 when its Terran 1 rocket — made almost entirely using 3D printing — became the first 3D-printed rocket to reach space. The rocket did not complete its original mission, but it crossed the Kármán line, the boundary of space, and that proved the core idea worked. Since then, Relativity has shifted focus to Terran R, a larger rocket that can land itself and fly again. Back in July 2022, the company announced plans with another firm called Impulse Space to send cargo to Mars using that reusable vehicle.

The rocket engines needed for this work are also coming together. Relativity has been testing engines at NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi since October 2022. In September 2023, that arrangement expanded to include a major test stand — called A-2 — that has a notable history. The same stand tested engines for the Saturn V rockets that took astronauts to the Moon, and later tested engines for NASA's new Space Launch System. That NASA would let a startup use such a historically important facility speaks to how much confidence the agency has in Relativity's progress, a confidence that clearly existed long before this Mars mission deal was announced.

The Competitive Landscape

Relativity is not racing to Mars alone. Blue Origin received a NASA contract for a Mars mission in February 2023 using its New Glenn rocket, which is larger and had already flown more times by the time it won the award. The fact that NASA is now handing out a second Mars contract to a smaller, less-proven company says something about how the agency currently views Mars missions. NASA is not treating access to Mars as something so difficult that only one company should handle it.

Relativity's finances have been solid for a startup of its size. A $650 million funding round in June 2021 was specifically earmarked for building Terran R. Money alone cannot buy what the NASA partnership provides: a genuine mission with real stakes that signals to other paying customers that this company can deliver on complex space operations.

The Harder Challenge Ahead

The broader story here is worth understanding. Mars orbits around the Sun in a pattern that only allows for good launch windows every 26 months or so — this is basic orbital mechanics. When a company takes on the job of building the spacecraft, the rocket, and managing the cruise phase of a Mars mission, it is accepting a type of complexity well beyond simply launching a satellite into Earth orbit. Cruise operations — the months-long journey from Earth to Mars — require the spacecraft to think for itself for long stretches, rely on radio signals sent over millions of miles through NASA's Deep Space Network, and adjust course with precision that historically only NASA's own teams or their long-time contractors have done.

It remains genuinely unclear whether Relativity has all these capabilities fully built and tested, or whether NASA will provide the expertise for the cruise phase while Relativity concentrates on building the hardware. The June 17 announcement does not spell out exactly how the work will be divided between the two organizations. That division will matter a great deal when the spacecraft is tens of millions of miles away and something goes wrong.

What the announcement does make clear is how Relativity Space sees itself now. The company is no longer hoping to be another small-satellite launcher. It has a name on one of the most technically difficult missions that the U.S. space program undertakes, and that changes what the company is in the eyes of potential customers, investors, and the space industry at large.