LORRI Images from the Arrokoth Flyby

(displayed in raw form without special stretching)

Welcome to the New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) image site, where NASA and the New Horizons mission are happy to provide these JPEG images - displayed in raw form without special processing - for the public to use and enjoy.

Given Arrokoth's relatively small size (it's approximately 20 miles across), LORRI didn't actually start to resolve the object (that is, see it as more than a point of light) until Dec. 29, 2018, when the New Horizons spacecraft closed to within 2 million miles (3 million kilometers). The New Horizons team began posting LORRI images on Dec. 30, 2018, when Arrokoth (officially named 2014 MU69) was approximately 1.5 pixels across in the full-resolution ("1x1" mode) pictures.

The resolution improved each day, allowing all to watch as Arrokoth was transformed from a barely resolved object into a new world never seen before. In the images posted on Jan. 1, 2019, Arrokoth was approximately 3 pixels across; it then grew to approximately 100 pixels across for the images posted on Jan. 2, and approximately 200 pixels across for the images posted on Jan. 3.

Images received at the New Horizons Science Operations Center through each Tuesday at 5 pm ET are posted on the following Friday. The date/time in the image caption is when the picture was taken by the spacecraft, though receipt of the data on Earth could be many days later.

In addition, the fully validated and calibrated images will be made available at NASA's Planetary Data System within a year after receipt of all images on the ground. All images will be available to the public, but please refer to the official New Horizons Image Use Policy for guidance on their use and attribution.

Learn more about these images »