Artemis II launch tracker. Follow astronauts as they fly around moon

• NASA's Artemis II mission will send four astronauts on a 10-day journey around the moon.
• The public can follow the mission in real time using NASA's Artemis Real-time Orbit Website (AROW).
• This mission is a test flight to pave the way for a future moon landing as early as 2028.
• The crew includes three NASA astronauts and one Canadian Space Agency astronaut.

Four astronauts are about to venture farther from Earth than any humans ever have. Want to follow along with them as they travel a quarter-of-a-million miles away on NASA's trailblazing Artemis II moon mission?

Lucky for you, the U.S. space agency has an app for that. And a desktop website, too.

After potentially launching April 1 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the astronauts are due to pilot an Orion crew capsule on a 10-day journey around the moon and back. The second under NASA's multibillion-dollar Artemis program, the mission will pave the way for a moon landing as early as 2028.

Here's what to know about NASA's Artemis II tracker.

Artemis II tracker. Follow moon mission in real time

NASA's online tracker available both on desktop and as a mobile app allows you to follow along with the Artemis II astronauts as they venture toward and around the moon aboard an Orion crew capsule.

The tracker, officially referred to as the "Artemis Real-time Orbit Website" (AROW,) allows users to not only see where the Orion spacecraft is and how fast it's traveling, but to see in miles its distance from both the Earth and the moon, according to NASA.

The interface of the desktop website version includes key mission milestones and characteristics about the moon, including information about landing sites during the Apollo era. The mobile version for smartphones included in NASA's app is similar, with the addition of an augmented reality feature that allows users to move their phones to see where Orion currently is relative to Earth.

The data is collected in real time by sensors on Orion and then sent to the Mission Control Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. That information will be constantly updated beginning about one minute after liftoff until Orion begins its re-entry into Earth's atmosphere about 10 days later.

What time is the Artemis II rocket launch today?

NASA is working toward a Wednesday, April 1, launch of its Artemis II mission from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Hitching a ride atop NASA's 322-foot Space Launch System rocket, the Orion capsule the astronauts will ride toward the moon is due to get off the ground during a two-hour launch window opening at 6:24 p.m. ET.

The weather conditions have an 80% chance of being favorable for a launch, according to NASA. But if bad weather or any other factors – such as an unforeseen issue with the spacecraft – scuttle liftoff, NASA has other backup dates available April 2-6, as well as April 30.

Artemis II launch countdown

Artemis rocket launch to take 4 astronauts around the moon

Under its Artemis campaign, NASA is aiming to return astronauts to the surface of the moon for the first time since the Apollo missions came to an end in 1972.

NASA is looking to establish a permanent foothold on the lunar south pole, using a series of crewed and uncrewed missions in the years ahead to build a moon base. From there, the first humans could be venturing to Mars.

As a 10-day moon-circling mission, Artemis II primarily serves as a test flight, with the four-person crew testing systems and hardware ahead of a future landing.

In 2027, another crew of astronauts is due to ride Orion to Earth orbit to test docking capabilities with one or both of the commercial lunar landers being developed by Elon Musk's SpaceX and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin. A lunar landing would then come in 2028 under Artemis IV.

Meet the Artemis II crew

The four crew members of Artemis II arrived March 27 in Florida after entering standard preflight quarantine to avoid illnesses. Here's a look:

• NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman, a Baltimore native and the mission's commander who last flew to space in 2014 on a Russian Soyuz rocket to the International Space Station.
• NASA astronaut Victor Glover, the pilot from Pomona, California, who flew to space in 2020 on a SpaceX mission to the space station.
• NASA astronaut Christina Koch, a mission specialist from Grand Rapids, Michigan, who holds several space agency records and who flew in 2019 on a Soyuz ISS mission.
• Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, another mission specialist who will fly to space for the first time.

Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at [email protected]