Perseverance Sets Record for Driving Distance Beyond Earth

On October 11, 2026, NASA's Perseverance rover drove farther across the surface of Mars than any vehicle before it on another world. That day its odometer read 28.10 miles (45.22 km), beating the previous record of 28.06 miles (45.16 km) held by the Opportunity rover. NASA announced it on October 12.

Perseverance reached the record mark on the 2,006th Martian day of the mission. The rover covered in five and a half years the distance that took Opportunity nearly 15 years. The mark came on a stretch at the western edge of Jezero Crater that the team calls Lac de Charmes, on the way to a point called Idubi. The rocks there may be among the oldest terrain ever explored in the solar system: their Earth analogues were long ago erased by erosion and the movement of plates, and Mars has no plates. At Idubi, scientists hope to find traces of ancient hydrothermal systems.

The rover drove most of the way itself. The AutoNav autonomous navigation system images the terrain as it moves, builds a three-dimensional map of obstacles, and plots a route between points set from Earth. AutoNav accounts for more than 90% of Perseverance's total distance, whereas the first Martian AutoNav, aboard Opportunity and Spirit, accounted for about 5%. In a single view the system processes 600,000 points, while NASA's first rover, Sojourner, estimated its path from 20 points. In one Martian day Perseverance is capable of driving up to 1,351 feet (412 meters).

The record is also higher than the lunar results: Perseverance has already passed the Apollo 17 crew, who drove 22.2 miles (35.7 km) in 1972, and the Soviet Lunokhod 2, which covered 24.2 miles (39 km) in 1973. By October 11, 2026, the Curiosity rover had driven more than 23.65 miles (38.07 km) and continues to work. Spirit left 4.8 miles (7.7 km), and Sojourner about 330 feet (100 meters) over 83 sols in 1997.

NASA approved the first mission extension: it began in October and runs through roughly the end of 2028. Project manager Steven Lee of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory recalled that the mission was originally expected to cover no more than 12.4 miles. According to him, all mobility systems are working, and life-extension tests produced a favorable result, so the rover is expected to keep increasing the record for many years.

Image: semeion.photo Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/Simeon Schmauß CC BY 2.0 · License

Translation editor: Ловушкин А.