| Instrument | Status/
Accuracy | Instrument Description | Measurement Technology | Timeline |
AHI
Advanced Himawari Imager | Operational
| Measures cloud cover, cloud motion, cloud height, cloud properties, water vapour, rainfalll, sea surface temperatures and Earth radiation, dust, aerosols, volcanic ash, fires, snow and ice cover. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer |  |
AIRS
Atmospheric Infra-red Sounder | Operational
| High spectral resolution measurement of temperature and humidity profiles in the atmosphere. Long-wave Earth surface emissivity. Cloud diagnostics. Trace gas profiles. Surface temperatures. | n/a | |
AMI
Advanced Meteorological Imager | Operational
| Continuous monitoring capability for the near real-time generation of high-resolution meteorological products and long-term change analysis of land/sea surface temperature and cloud coverage. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
AMSU-A
Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A | Operational
| All-weather night-day temperature sounding to an altitude of 45 km. | n/a | |
AMSU-A
Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit-A | Operational
| All-weather night-day temperature sounding to an altitude of 45 km. AMSU-A on Aqua is still partially operational, with 9 of the 15 channels working and collecting data. | n/a | |
AVHRR/3
Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer/3 | Operational
| Measurements of land and sea surface temperature, cloud cover, snow and ice cover, soil moisture and vegetation indices. Data also used for volcanic eruption monitoring. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
AWiFS
Advanced Wide Field Sensor | Operational
| Vegetation and crop monitoring, resource assessment (regional scale), forest mapping, land cover/ land use mapping, and change detection. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
C-Band SAR
C-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar | Operational
| Marine core services, land monitoring and emergency services. Monitoring sea ice zones and arctic environment. Surveillance of marine environment, monitoring land surface motion risks, mapping of land surfaces (forest, water and soil, agriculture), mapping in support of humanitarian aid in crisis situations. | n/a | |
CSG SAR
COSMO-SkyMed di Seconda Generazione SAR | Operational
| All-weather images of ocean, land and ice for monitoring of land surface processes, ice, environmental monitoring, risk management, environmental resources, maritime management, Earth topographic mapping. | n/a | |
FCI
Flexible Combined Imager | Operational
| Measurements of cloud cover, cloud top height, precipitation, cloud motion, vegetation, radiation fluxes, convection, air mass analysis, cirrus cloud discrimination, tropopause monitoring, stability monitoring, total ozone and sea surface temperature. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
Geoton-L1 (2)
Geoton-L1 | Operational
| Multispectral images of land surfaces and Oceans. | High resolution optical imager | |
GSA (1)
Hyperspectral imaging equipment | Operational
| Land surface monitoring | n/a | |
HSI-2 (HJ-2A)
Hyper Spectrum Imager 2 | Operational
| Hyperspectral measurements for environment and disaster management operations. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
Imager (INSAT 3D)
Very High Resolution Radiometer | Operational
| Cloud cover, severe storm warnings/monitoring day and night (type, amount, storm features), atmospheric radiance winds, atmospheric stability rainfall. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
KMSS
Multispectral Imager (VIS) system | Operational
| Multispectral images of land & sea surfaces and ice cover. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
KShMSA-VR
High resolution wide capture multispectral optical sensor | Operational
| Land surface and ocean monitoring | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
LISS-III (Resourcesat)
Linear Imaging Self Scanner - III (Resourcesat) | Operational
| Data used for vegetation type assessment, resource assessment, crop stress detection, crop production forecasting, forestry, land use and land cover change. | High resolution optical imager | |
LISS-IV
Linear Imaging Self Scanner - IV | Operational
| Vegetation monitoring, improved crop discrimination, crop yield, disaster monitoring and rapid assessment of natural resources. | High resolution optical imager | |
MBEI
Multi-Band Earth Imager | Operational
| Multispectral scanner images of land surface. | High resolution optical imager | |
MODIS
MODerate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer | Operational
| Data on biological and physical processes on the surface of the Earth and in the lower atmosphere, and on global dynamics. Surface temperatures of land and ocean, chlorophyll fluorescence, land cover measurements, cloud cover (day and night). | n/a | |
MSS
Multispectral imaging system | Operational
| Multispectral images of land & sea surfaces and ice cover. | High resolution optical imager | |
MSU-GS
Multispectral scanning imager-radiometer | Operational
| Measurements of cloud cover, cloud top height, precipitation, cloud motion, albedo, vegetation, convection, air mass analysis, tropopause monitoring, stability monitoring, total ozone and surface temperature, fire detection. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
MSU-GS/VE
Multispectral scanning imager-radiometer | Operational
| Operational metrology, hydrology, climate monitoring and environmental monitoring | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
MSU-IK-SR
Multi-channel medium and far IR range radiometer | Operational
| Parameters of clouds, snow, ice and land cover, vegetation, surface temperature, fire detection. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
MSU-MR
Low-resolution multispectral scanning imager-radiometer | Operational
| Parameters of clouds, snow, ice and land cover, vegetation, surface temperature, fire detection. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
MVIRS
Moderate Resolution Visible and Infrared Imaging Spectroradiometer | Operational
| Measures surface temperature and cloud and ice cover. Used for snow and flood monitoring and surface temperature. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
MWRI
Micro-Wave Radiation Imager | Operational
| All weather observations of precipitation, cloud features, vegetation, soil moisture sea ice, etc. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
OLI
Operational Land Imager | Operational
| Measures surface radiance, land cover state, and change (e.g., vegetation type). Used as multi-purpose imagery for land applications. | High resolution optical imager | |
OLI-2
Operational Land Imager 2 | Operational
| Measures surface radiance, land cover state, and change (e.g., vegetation type). Used as multi-purpose imagery for land applications. | High resolution optical imager | |
OLS
Operational Linescan System | Operational
| Day and night cloud cover imagery. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
PALSAR-2
Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar-2 | Operational
| Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry. | n/a | |
PSS
Panchromatic imaging system | Operational
| Panchromatic data for environmental monitoring, agriculture and forestry. | High resolution optical imager | |
SAR (RADARSAT-2)
Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) C band | Operational
| All-weather images of ocean, ice and land surfaces. Used for monitoring of coastal zones, polar ice, sea ice, sea state, geological features, vegetation and land surface processes. | n/a | |
SAR (RCM)
Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) C band | Operational
| All-weather, C-band data to support ecosystem monitoring, maritime surveillance and disaster management. | n/a | |
SAR (RISAT)
Synthetic Aperature Radiometer (RISAT) | Operational
| Radar backscatter measurements of land, water and ocean surfaces for applications in soil moisture, crop applications (under cloud cover), terrain mapping, etc. | n/a | |
SAR 2000
Synthetic Aperture Radar - 2000 | Operational
| All-weather images of ocean, land and ice for monitoring of land surface processes, ice, environmental monitoring, risk management, environmental resources, maritime management, Earth topographic mapping. | n/a | |
SAR-L
L-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar | Operational
| Land, ocean, emergencies, soil moisture, interferometry, others. | n/a | |
SGLI
Second-generation Global Imager | Operational
+/-7 % | Medium resolution multi-spectral imaging of land, ocean and atmosphere. SGLI-VNR is an optical sensor capable of multi-channel nadir observation at wavelengths from near-UV to NIR and forward or backward polarization observation at red and near infrared wavelengths (Push-broom scanning). SGLI-IRS is an optical sensor capable of multi-channel nadir observation at wavelengths from SWIR to TIR wavelengths (Cross-track scanning). | n/a | |
TIRS
Thermal Infrared Sensor | Operational
| Measures longwave thermal infrared surface emittance, land cover state, and change. Used as multipurpose imagery for land applications. | n/a | |
TIRS-2
Thermal Infrared Sensor 2 | Operational
| Measures longwave thermal infrared surface emittance, land cover state, and change. Used as multipurpose imagery for land applications. TIRS-2 will adhere to the Landsat 8 TIRS instrument performance specifications but will be built to NASA Class-B instrument standards (including a 5-year design life). | n/a | |
VIIRS
Visible/Infrared Imager Radiometer Suite | Operational
| Global observations of land, ocean, and atmosphere parameters: cloud/weather imagery, sea-surface temperature, ocean colour, land surface vegetation indices. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
WSAR
WSAR | Operational
| High resolution radar measurements of land and ocean features. | n/a | |
X-Band SAR
X-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar | Operational
| High resolution images for monitoring of land surface and coastal processes and for agricultural, geological and hydrological applications. | n/a | |
ALISS III
Advanced LISS III | Being developed
| For crops and vegetation dynamics, natural resources census, disaster management and large scale mapping of themes. | High resolution optical imager | |
LISS-V
Linear Imaging Self Scanner-V | Being developed
| Vegetation monitoring, improved crop discrimination, crop yield, disaster monitoring and rapid assessment of natural resources. | High resolution optical imager | |
METimage
Multi Spectral Imager | Being developed
| Operational multi spectral imager for meteorological EPS-SG VIS/IR Imaging Mission (VII): imagery data for global and regional NWP, NWC, and climate monitoring with information on LST, SST, clouds coverage, height and micro-physics, land surfaces (vegetation, snow/ice, fire), water vapour column, aerosol and atmospheric motion vectors. Provides collocated cloud mask, height & characterisation as well as intra-pixel heterogeneity to other EPS-SG missions (with larger footprint). | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
PALSAR-3
Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar-3 | Being developed
| Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry. | n/a | |
GHMI
Geostationary HiMawari Imager | Approved
| | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
Advanced KMSS
Advanced Multispectral Imager (VIS) | Proposed
| Multispectral images of land & sea surfaces and ice cover. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
Advanced MSU-MR
Advanced Multispectral scanning imager-radiometer | Proposed
| Parameters of clouds, snow, ice and land cover, vegetation, surface temperature, fire detection. | Multi-purpose imaging Vis/IR radiometer | |
LandIS
Landsat Next Instrument Suite | Proposed
| Measures surface radiance, land cover state and change (e.g., vegetation type), and longwave termal infrared surface emittance. Used as multi-purpose imagery for land applications. | High resolution optical imager | |
L-Band SAR
L-Band Synthetic Aperture Radar | Proposed
| Global observation of dynamic processes in the bio-, cryo-, geo- and hydrosphere. | n/a | |
SWIR
Short Wave Infra Red | No longer considered
| | n/a | |