Scientists now say an interstellar comet discovered earlier this month could be one of the oldest that astronomers have ever encountered.

NASA has discovered an interstellar comet that's wandered into our backyard. Luckily, it won't get near enough to be a threat to our planet.

Discover the rare interstellar comet 3i/Atlas, recently confirmed by NASA in July 2025. Learn what makes interstellar comets unique visitors from other star systems, their composition, and their hyperbolic paths through our solar system.

Dubbed 3I/ATLAS, it is blazing through our cosmic cul-de-sac at truly awe-inspiring speeds between the main asteroid belt and Jupiter.

The icy traveler, called 3I/ATLAS or Comet ATLAS, was discovered on July 1 by the NASA -funded ATLAS survey telescope in Río Hurtado, Chile. This enormous space snowball came from the direction of the constellation Sagittarius and is about 300 million miles from Earth right now.

July 3 (UPI) -- NASA discovered the third interstellar comet through a survey telescope in Rio Hurtado, Chile. The interstellar comet first observed on Tuesday by NASA's Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Alert System telescope, or ATLAS, has been officially named 3I/ATLAS .

When NASA's DART mission crashed into the asteroid Dimorphos, the first stage of the impact saw the spacecraft's solar panels strike and pulverize two large boulders on the target, debris from which spun off in two directions.