The largest impact basin on Mars — and a place two nations have landed.
Utopia Planitia is the largest recognized impact basin on Mars, spanning some 3,300 km across the northern lowlands. It is celebrated ground: NASA's Viking 2 touched down here in 1976, and China's Zhurong rover landed in 2021.
Claim your plot here →Utopia Planitia is a colossal plain filling the largest recognized impact basin on Mars, roughly 3,300 km wide. Radar surveys have revealed a huge buried sheet of water ice beneath its surface — one 2016 study compared the frozen volume to Earth's Lake Superior — making it both scientifically rich and a potential resource for future crews.
It is also historic. NASA's Viking 2 lander set down here in 1976, and in 2021 China's Tianwen-1 mission delivered the Zhurong rover, making Utopia one of the few places on Mars visited by spacecraft from more than one nation.
At ~3,300 km, Utopia edges out even the deep Hellas basin as the largest recognized impact structure on Mars.
The buried ice detected here has been compared in volume to Earth's Lake Superior.