Introducing Owl: Planet's Most Advanced Satellite Mission Yet
Simulated 1-meter class imagery depicting Nakhodka, Russia. Created using Planet SkySat data.
NewsUnprecedented Detail at Unprecedented Speed
Since our founding in 2011, our mission has been simple yet bold: to make the Earth visible, accessible, and actionable. By pioneering a new approach to space, we built and now operate the world’s largest commercial network of Earth-imaging satellites. This effort has resulted in Planet’s core product: our global, near-daily scan, which has an unmatched data archive dating back to 2017, capturing years of near-daily imagery for every point of Earth’s landmass and offering unparalleled temporal depth for AI and analytics. Our global scan is a core element of our business, and remains unprecedented in Earth observation.
That’s why today we’re excited to introduce Owl™: our next-generation monitoring fleet. With a technical demonstration slated for launch late next year, and the Owl fleet moving into production and launch over the following years, Owl will be designed to deliver frequent, best-in-class imagery faster, enabling customers to receive imagery-enabled insights within as little as one hour of capture. Owls will also include the latest NVIDIA graphics processing units (GPUs) to enable AI at the edge, and help redefine what can be seen and what value we can unlock. We’re excited for this satellite fleet to help further our mission to achieve global security and sustainability.
A rendering of Planet’s next-generation monitoring spacecraft Owl.
Why Owl? In keeping with naming our satellites after birds, we chose owls given their keen eyesight and wisdom. This new, state-of-the-art fleet of satellites aims to support Planet’s global near-daily scan capabilities while providing seamless continuity with the existing SuperDove fleet.
Going beyond the currently available 3-4 meter resolution imagery, these new satellites are expected to deliver near-daily, 1-meter class imagery at low latency – a consistent, high-fidelity dataset ideal for integration with the leading AI foundation models and unprecedented among commercial providers. Owl is slated to share the same core spectral bands as our SuperDove constellation, providing uninterrupted compatibility with existing workflows. Planet plans to also offer products that showcase its improved resolution, expanding what customers can explore and accomplish with Planet imagery, from assessing damage after a disaster to detecting vessels to enabling better mapping.
Planet is proud to have helped lead the Earth observation industry with a series of firsts that have not only ushered in a new commercial space ecosystem, but provided critical value within security, commercial, and civil government sectors. It is exactly because PlanetScope Monitoring, enabled by the SuperDove fleet, has become such a foundational piece of the business, and has set the bar for what customers have come to rely on for near-daily, global monitoring, that Planet is committed to continuing to advance and evolve it.
Next-Generation Monitoring Capabilities - Unlocking More With AI
Many Planet customers subscribe to PlanetScope’s global scan and basemap imagery to monitor change over time in key areas of interest (AOIs) around the world. Leveraging Planet’s proprietary, vertically-integrated technology stack, the enhanced capabilities of the Owl constellation are intended to deliver the continuity customers expect while providing high-quality, wide-swath, 1-meter class panchromatic and multispectral imagery at low latencies.
Looking ahead, a higher-performance and future-proofed mission requires a more capable and advanced spacecraft. Planet’s Owl mission will therefore leverage an upgraded version of our “SmallSat” modular avionics platform, as introduced by our Pelican™ and Tanager™ satellites, allowing the mission to benefit from technological and operational improvements that drive increased capacity, image quality, and low latency.
Planet plans to provide rapid insights by integrating AI directly into the Owl satellites. This will allow for onboard analysis, which means insights — like identifying objects, detecting anomalies, or flagging activity — can be derived at the sensor's edge and reach customers faster. Owl is designed to be highly complementary with our high-resolution, rapid-tasking Pelican fleet, allowing Planet customers to leverage tip and cue with even more speed and accuracy, helping quickly identify and even predict the changes and patterns that critically impact their businesses and global security.
Providing high-quality, low-latency, and truly global insights is the central objective of this mission. Planet’s unparalleled proprietary data archive, experience from serving thousands of monitoring and tasking customers across all industry verticals, and flexible architecture makes it uniquely suited to realize this vision.
Simulated 1-meter class image of a Russian port. This conceptual image was created using Planet SkySat data.
Built for the Future
Designed with upgradability in mind, Planet is engaging with select partners and customers to evaluate their future needs and incubate strategic space systems partnerships that could drive a roadmap of further product improvements across spatial, spectral, and temporal dimensions.
While the Owl satellite’s capabilities alone can make it a major leap forward in Earth observation (EO) technology, we believe it’s capable of even more – including reshaping the traditional EO model itself. Gathering detailed intelligence currently requires tasking over known AOIs, but this high-resolution, daily scanning mission can provide a foundational layer of awareness that derives valuable intelligence in moments. This would allow customers to detect changes as they occur, with the potential to disrupt the industry even further by removing the need for a customer to directly task a satellite for 1-m class imagery.
Applications and Use Cases
The Owl fleet has the potential to unlock expansive new use cases across a variety of industries:
- Global Security: Defense and intelligence customers can expect to see drastic improvements in their ability to detect and classify objects like aircraft or vessels across broad areas, and even receive timely activity updates that drive action. This enhanced imagery can help identify smaller objects, decrease response time, and increase situational awareness.
- Commercial Applications: From insurance to construction and forestry, businesses can leverage the data to monitor events on the ground and make better, more timely decisions. For example, insurance providers could use the higher resolution for significantly improved damage assessment after natural catastrophes.
- Civil Agencies: Civil governments can use the improved imagery to track natural events like wildfires and droughts with more precision, more quickly help with disaster relief efforts, and even use more accurate building footprints to support permit enforcement.
Timeline
The initial development phase of this program is already underway. Planet plans to first develop an internal technology demonstration mission designed to de-risk the new technologies prior to deployment of an initial fleet. The tech demo is slated for launch in late 2026, with the Owl fleet moving into production and launch over the following years.
Planet has always helped our customers stay one step ahead by dreaming big and achieving what others thought impossible, and we’re proud to continue this work with Owl. It's how we enable everyone, governments, businesses, and communities, to move towards our common goal: to improve life on Earth.
To learn more about our fleet and its capabilities, visit planet.com/constellations/owl.
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