James Webb Space Telescope posted a photo:
On July 12, 2026, we celebrated four years of Webb science! And what a time it has been! We've learned so much about our universe and ourselves.
Here are some of our favorite images and most interesting science results in the form of a little retrospective in six parts, by year, which we will link in all the captions below. Each collage highlights science from the main science themes: Early Universe, Other Worlds, Galaxies, and Star Lifecycles.
This image:
2023: Clockwise ->
Uranus, surrounded by rings. Several bright blue point are the planet’s moons. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI.
Star cluster IC 348, containing three free-floating brown dwarfs that are less than eight times the mass of Jupiter. The wispy curtains filling the image are interstellar material reflecting the light from the cluster’s stars. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Kevin Luhman (PSU), Catarina Alves de Oliveira (ESA).
Sagittarius C (Sgr C). A 50 light-years-wide portion of the Milky Way’s dense center, with an estimated 500,000 stars shine in this image of the region, along with some as-yet unidentified features. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, Samuel Crowe (UVA).
Galaxy cluster SDSS J1226+2152 in the constellation Coma Berenices has such immense mass that it distorts and magnifies the light from more distant galaxies behind it — giving these galaxies their stretched out shape. The effect is known as gravitational lensing, and it allows astronomers to study some of the most distant galaxies in the universe. Credit: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, J. Rigby and the JWST TEMPLATES team.
LHS 475b spectrum, the first use of Webb to confirm an exoplanet. The graphic shows the transmission spectrum of the rocky exoplanet, showing a lack of a detectable quantity of any element or molecule, potentially indicating no atmosphere. Credit: Illustration: NASA, ESA, CSA, Leah Hustak (STScI); Science: Kevin Stevenson (APL), Jacob Lustig-Yaeger (APL), Erin May (APL), Guangwei Fu (JHU), Sarah Moran (University of Arizona).
Supernova remnant Cass A in the near infrared. Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, D. Milisavljevic (Purdue), T. Temim (Princeton), I. De Looze (Ghent University), with image processing by J. DePasquale (STScI)
See our gallery of Webb's images and data from 2023:
www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/albums/7217772030...
First Images: www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/55393938950/
2022: www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/55393675403/
2023: www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/55393726239/
2024:h www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/55393541751/
2025: www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/55392607987/
2026...so far! www.flickr.com/photos/nasawebbtelescope/55393541756/
































