All times CEST. Times subject to change at short notice

Watch live from 13:45 on 13 April

Tune into ESA Web TV directly or via YouTube continuous stream to follow the launch live:

13:45–16:05 Launch programme
16:30–17:15 Post-launch press briefing

A french version with interpreters will run on Web TV channel two

Key milestones
On launch day the following key milestones will be included in the launch programme and covered by ESA social media channels.

14:15 Juice launch on Ariane 5
14:42 Separation of Juice from Ariane 5 upper stage
14:51 Earliest expected time to acquire Juice’s signal
15:55 Solar array deployment expected to be completed

Times are specific to launch taking place on 13 April and may vary by a few minutes.

Press release

An ESA press release will be issued upon successful solar array deployment, at approximately 16:00 CEST.

First images
Juice is equipped with two monitoring cameras that will capture parts of the solar array deployment following launch, and a few days later the deployment of the 16 m-long radar antenna. If suitable images are acquired, they will be made available for publication at earliest possibility.

Beyond launch day

Over the two and a half weeks following launch, Juice will deploy its various antennas and instrument booms, which will be reported on Twitter by @ESA_JUICE and @esaoperations in the first instance. An intense three-month commissioning of Juice’s scientific instruments will also follow.

The first of four gravity assist flybys in the inner Solar System will take place in August 2024 with a lunar-Earth gravity-assist – a flyby of the Moon followed 1.5 days later by one of Earth.  

Join the #ESAJuice social media conversation

Follow @ESA_JUICE @esaoperations @ESA_STS and @esascience for live Juice coverage.

Join the conversation with #ESAJuice

Ask questions via #AskESA – yours may be asked during the live launch broadcast!

Follow ESA on:

Twitter: @ESA

Instagram: Europeanspaceagency

Facebook: EuropeanSpaceAgency

YouTube: ESA

LinkedIn: European Space Agency – ESA

Pinterest: European Space Agency – ESA

About Juice

ESA’s Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer, ‘Juice’, is humankind’s next bold mission to the outer Solar System. It will make detailed observations of gas giant Jupiter and its three large ocean-bearing moons – Ganymede, Callisto and Europa. This ambitious mission will characterise these moons with a powerful suite of remote sensing, geophysical and in situ instruments to discover more about these compelling destinations as potential habitats for past or present life. Juice will monitor Jupiter’s complex magnetic, radiation and plasma environment in depth and its interplay with the moons, studying the Jupiter system as an archetype for gas giant systems across the Universe. 

Juice launches on an Ariane 5 from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou in April 2023. It has an eight-year cruise with flybys of Earth and Venus to slingshot it to Jupiter. It will make 35 flybys of the three large moons while orbiting Jupiter, before changing orbits to Ganymede.

Juice is a mission under ESA leadership with contributions from NASA, JAXA and the Israel Space Agency. It is the first Large-class mission in ESA’s Cosmic Vision programme.