The Artemis 2 mission was a historic success that went far beyond a lunar flyby. The mission turned Florida’s Space Coast into one of the most visited places on Earth, according to data released by the Space Coast Office of Tourism on May 7, 2026.
Approximately 346,000 American visitors traveled to northern Brevard County for the Artemis 2 launch campaign. The number of visitors was approximately equal to the entire population of Honolulu, Hawaii.
Consistent with data collection, the Space Coast Office of Tourism collected these figures using cellular device-tracking software to monitor adults visiting from outside the area.
The actual crowd was likely much larger, as the tracking did not count international visitors, children, people without phones, or local residents.
“This does not include international phone carriers, children, people without phones, disabled phones or Brevard County residents,” the office said in an emailed statement.
The 10-day mission sent four astronauts—Reed Wiseman (NASA), Victor Glover (NASA), Christina Koch (NASA), and Jeremy Hansen (CSA) on a historic loop around the Moon.
It was the first crewed mission to travel beyond Earth’s orbit since Apollo 17 in 1972. The Space Coast Office of Tourism said the unmanned Artemis 1, scheduled to launch into lunar orbit in November 2022, generated 226,000 visitors.
In contrast, a typical Artemis 2 visitor spent two days ashore and SAIL software showed an average spend of $462. These figures were calculated using cellular tracking data and extracted from different tourism surveys.
