| Instrument | Status/
Accuracy | Instrument Description | Measurement Technology | Timeline |
| AMSR2 | Operational +/-4 % | Accuracy of the latest standard products (RMSE): Sea surface temperature: 0.5 degC, Sea ice concentration: 9%, Cloud liquid water: 0.04 kg/m2, Water vapour: 1.5 kg/m2 through total column, Sea surface wind speed 1.0 m/s, (Relative Error in %) Precipitation rate: 37 % for ocean & 62 % for land. (MAE) Snow depth: 18 cm, Soil Moisture Content: 4 %vol. See AMSR Data Catalog (https://www.eorc.jaxa.jp/AMSR/datacatalog/index_en.html) for more detail. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer |  |
| AMSR3 | Operational +/-4.54 % | Measurements of water vapour, cloud liquid water, precipitation including snowfall, winds, sea surface temperature, sea ice concentration, snow cover, soil moisture. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| AMSU-A | Operational | All-weather night-day temperature sounding to an altitude of 45 km. | n/a | |
| AMSU-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 | |
| ASCAT | Operational | Measures wind speed and direction over ocean, soil moisture, sea ice cover, sea ice type, snow cover and snow parameters and vegetation parameters | Radar scatterometer | |
| C-Band SAR | 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. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| CSG 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. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| GMI | Operational | Measures rainfall rates over oceans and land, combined rainfall structure and surface rainfall rates with associated latent heating. Used to produce three hour, daily, and monthly total rainfall maps over oceans and land. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| L-band Radiometer (SMAP) | Operational | High-accuracy measurements of brightness temperatures for global estimates of surface soil moisture for climate modeling and weather prediction | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| MIRAS (SMOS) | Operational | Objective is to meassure sea surface salinity and soil moisture in support of climate, meteorology, hydrology, and oceanography applications. New applications include Soil freeze/thaw, ocean severe winds, sea ice thickness, vegetation optical depth and solar flux. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| MWRI-RM | Operational | Multi-purpose imagery with emphasis on precipitation | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| PALSAR-2 | Operational | Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| PALSAR-3 | Operational | Disaster monitoring, land monitoring, agricultural monitoring, natural resource exploration, global forest monitoring, potential use and interferometry. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| PAZ SAR-X | Operational | High resolution X-band radar for security, land use, urban management, environmental monitoring, risk management. Spotlight, Scansar and Stripmap acquisition modes. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| SAR (RADARSAT-2) | 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. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| SAR (RISAT) | Operational | Radar backscatter measurements of land, water and ocean surfaces for applications in soil moisture, crop applications (under cloud cover), terrain mapping, etc. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| SAR-L | Operational | Land, ocean, emergencies, soil moisture, interferometry, others. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| S-Band SAR (HJ-2) | Operational | Radar measurements for natural and disaster monitoring. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| S-band SAR (NISAR) | Operational | 3-year mission to study solid earth deformation (earthquakes, volcanoes, landslides), changes in ice (glaciers, sea ice) and changes in vegetation biomass | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| SGR-ReSI-Z | Operational +/-0.04 m3-m-3 | Ocean winds, waves, soil moisture, flooding, freeze / thaw state over permafrost, biomass, ice, snow | n/a | |
| SSM/IS | Operational | Measures thermal microwave radiation. Global measurements of air temp profile, humidity profile, ocean surface winds, rain overland/ocean, ice concentration/age, ice/snow edge, water vapour/clouds over ocean, snow water content, land surface temperature. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| VIIRS | 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 | |
| SCA | Being developed | Measures wind speed and direction over ocean, soil moisture, sea ice cover, sea ice type, snow cover and snow parameters and vegetation parameters | Radar scatterometer | |
| SWIR Imager (THEOS-3) | Being developed | A medium-resolution shortwave-infrared optical payload designed to complement the VNIR instrument and expand THEOS-3 applications for natural resource exploration and environmental monitoring. SWIR data would support vegetation and soil moisture assessment, burned-area and fire-related analysis, mineral and geological mapping, water/cloud/snow discrimination, disaster monitoring, and land surface condition assessment. | n/a | |
| HSI | Approved | Pushbroom-type grating Imaging Spectrometer with high Signal-to-noise Ratio and data uniformity to derive quantitative surface characteristics supporting the monitoring, implementation and improvement of a range of policies in the domain of raw materials, agriculture, soils, food security, biodiversity, environmental degradation and hazards, inland and coastal waters, snow, forestry and the urban environment | n/a | |
| L-Band SAR | Approved | L-band SAR instrument combining wide swath, high spatial resolution, high sensitivity, low ambiguity ratios, full polarimetric acquisition capability, and repeat-pass interferometry to support the retrieval of surface deformation over vegetated terrain, above-ground biomass density, soil moisture, land cover and land-cover change, flooded area information, ice sheet and glacier velocity, snow water, sea-ice conditions (type, concentration and motion), ocean winds and sea state conditions, as well as enhancing European maritime situational awareness. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| LTI | Approved | The aim of MAGIC is to obtain high-resolution measurements in space and time and include the capability to determine the variations in gravity field due to mass change in hydrology, cryosphere, oceanography, solid Earth and climate change signals so as to serve science and operational products including emergency services. | n/a | |
| NG C-Band SAR | Approved | 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. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| GEO SAR | Proposed | Emergency services: monitoring of landslides, subsidence and ground deformation, seismic and volcanic phenomena, terrain and infrastructure stability, flood mapping.
Land: terrain stability, soil moisture and wetlands monitoring.
Atmosphere: 2D maps of water vapor concentration with high spatial and temporal resolution. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |
| AMSR-E | No longer operational | Measurements of water vapour, cloud liquid water, precipitation, winds, sea surface temperature, sea ice concentration, snow cover and soil moisture. Instrument stopped functioning 4th October 2011. | Multi-purpose imaging MW radiometer | |
| L-band Radar (SMAP) | No longer operational | High-resolution measurements of radar backscatter for global estimates of surface soil moisture and freeze/thaw states for climate modeling and weather prediction. The radar instrument stopped transmitting on 7 July 2015. | Imaging radar (SAR) | |