Timeline of the near future

This is a timeline of the near future, covering predicted or calculated events from the present until the end of the 23rd century.

For contemporary events, see Timelines of modern history.

This list is incomplete; you can help by expanding it.

This is a dynamic list and may never be able to satisfy particular standards for completeness. You can help by expanding it with reliably sourced entries.

21st century

For the current year, see 2020.

2020s

• 2021:
  • Brood X, the largest brood of the US seventeen-year cicadas, will emerge.[1]
  • The Red Line of the Tel Aviv Light Rail is scheduled to be completed.[2]
  • The James Webb Space Telescope is currently scheduled to launch in March.[3]
  • The rescheduled 2020 Summer Olympics will be held in Tokyo, Japan.
  • The Chinese large modular space station (China's third) is expected to launch.[4]
• 2022:
  • 2022 Winter Olympics will be held in Beijing, China.[5]
  • European Space Agency plans to launch JUICE for exploration of Jupiter's icy moons by 2022.[6]
  • 2022 FIFA World Cup to be held in Qatar.[7]
  • The first Indian bullet train project between the cities of Ahmedabad and Mumbai will be completed.
  • China's first space station is complete.[8]
• 2023:
  • London's new "super sewer" will be finished.[9]
  • The Compact of Free Association between the United States and the Federated States of Micronesia and the Marshall Islands expires.
  • Copyright on the earliest Mickey Mouse cartoons expires in the US under current copyright law.[10]
  • At some point in this year, SpaceX plans to send a private citizen (and a group of artists of their choosing) on a lunar free return tourism mission.[11]
• 2024:
  • The Fehmarn Belt Fixed Link between Denmark and Germany is expected to open.[12]
  • SpaceX plans to launch a human mission to Mars, with arrival due in 2025.[13]
  • 2024 Summer Olympics to be held in Paris, France.
• 2025:
  • The Giant Magellan Telescope is scheduled to have been completed.[14]
  • Planned completion of the Square Kilometre Array radio telescope.[15]
• 2026:
  • Construction of Sagrada Familia to be completed.[16]
  • 2026 FIFA World Cup to be held in Canada, Mexico and the US.
• 2028: 2028 Summer Olympics to be held in Los Angeles, California.
• 2029:
  • The Message From Earth will reach the Gliese 581 planetary system.
  • April 13: The asteroid 99942 Apophis will be visible to the naked eye within the Moon's orbit.

2030s

• 2030: European Space Agency's spacecraft JUICE is expected to enter the Jovian system.
• 2032: Transit of Mercury
• 2038: Year 2038 problem, similar to the Year 2000 problem that occurred on January 1, 2000.[17]
• 2039: Transit of Mercury

2040s

• 2040: Median value for the advent of artificial general intelligence according to a 2012 study of predictions thereof.[18] This could then quickly lead to the technological singularity.
• 2042: Global population reaches nine billion.
• 2045:
  • The estimated year that the technological singularity will occur according to Ray Kurzweil.[19]
  • South Korea expected that reunification of North Korea is possible.[20]
• 2047: On July 1, the People's Republic of China's obligation to run Hong Kong as a special administrative region per the Sino-British Joint Declaration expires, and with it the enforceability of the Hong Kong Basic Law.
• 2049: On December 20, the People's Republic of China's obligation to run Macau as a special administrative region per the Joint Declaration on the Question of Macau expires.

2050s

• 2050: Three-North Shelter Forest Program is expected to be completed.[21] Nearly half of the Amazon rainforest has been deforested.
• 2051: Cosmic Call 1 will reach its destination, the star Gliese 777.

2060s

• 2061: Halley's Comet returns to the inner Solar System. It reaches perihelion on July 28.
• 2065: Transit of Mercury and an occultation of Jupiter by Venus.
• 2067: Mercury occults Neptune.

2070s

• 2076: The planetoid 90377 Sedna reaches perihelion.
• 2077: Beginning of the 15th century in the Islamic calendar.

2080s

• 2084: The lease held by the Pitjantjatjara people on Uluru to Australian government set to expire.

22nd century

2100s

• 2100: On March 14 (which will be February 29 in the Julian calendar), the difference between the Julian calendar and the Gregorian calendar reaches 14 days. Since 14 is divisible by 7, this will be the first time in history since its inception that the Gregorian calendar has the same day of the week for each day of the year as the Julian calendar. This will last until February 28, 2200 of the Gregorian Calendar.
• Polaris appears furthest North. Polaris's maximum apparent declination (taking account of nutation and aberration) will be 0.4526° from the celestial north pole, on 24 March 2100.[22]
• 2103: Per an agreement between the National Archives and Caroline Kennedy, the jacket Jackie Kennedy wore on the day John F. Kennedy was assassinated cannot be displayed in public until this year.[23]

2110s

• 2110: According to Extreme Engineering from Discovery Channel, proposed Japanese mega-project Shimizu Mega-City Pyramid could be completed at this time.
• 2113: August will be the first time Pluto reaches aphelion since its discovery.
• 2114: Sedna overtakes Eris as the farthest known spheroid orbiting the Sun.
• 2117: December 10–11: Transit of Venus.

2120s

• 2123:
  • Triple conjunction Mars–Jupiter.
  • June 9: Long-duration lunar eclipse of approximately 106.1 minutes.[24]
  • At 15:28 UTC, on September 14, Venus will eclipse Jupiter.
• 2125: December 8: Transit of Venus.
• 2126: At 16:08 UTC on July 29, Mercury will occult Mars.

2130s

• 2134: Halley's Comet returns to the inner Solar System

2140s

• 2140: All Bitcoins will be mined.
• 2148: Triple conjunction Mars–Saturn.

2150s

• 2150: June 25: Solar eclipse of 7 min 14 s, Solar Saros 139.[25] This will be the first time an eclipse has exceeded 7 minutes of totality in 177 years; the last time this occurred was on June 30, 1973,[26] when the Concorde prototype followed the totality spot for 73 minutes.

2160s

• 2160: March 17 – Unless changes are made as to when Easter can be observed, this particular March 17 will fall within Holy Week for the first time since 2008 and fall on the same day (Monday) as it did in that year, likely requiring the movement of the Feast of Saint Patrick's Day to another date.[27]
• 2168: July 5: Solar eclipse of 7 min 26 s, Saros 139.[28]

2170s

• 2170: Triple conjunction Mars–Jupiter.
• 2174: The second full orbit of Neptune around the sun since its discovery in 1846.

2180s

• 2185: Triple conjunction Mars–Saturn.
• July 16, 2186 : Solar eclipse[29] of 7m 29 s (very close to the theoretical maximum), Saros 139,[30] "crowning" this series. This is predicted to be the longest eclipse during the current 10,000 year period, from 4000 BC to AD 6000 (eclipse predictions by Fred Espenak, NASA/GSFC.DEPP).[31]
• 2187: Triple conjunction Mars–Saturn.

2190s

• 2197: September 2: Venus occults Spica (the previous occultation of Spica by Venus was on November 10, 1783). The Moon will occult Neptune on December 24.

23rd century

2200s

• 2209: Return of Halley's Comet.

2220s

• 2221: Triple conjunction of Mars and Saturn.
• 2223: On December 2 at 12:32 UTC, Mars will occult Jupiter.

2230s

• Triple conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn.

2240s

• 2240: 7th millennium begins in the Hebrew calendar.
• 2243: On August 12 at 04:52 UTC, Venus will occult Saturn.
• 2247: Transit of Venus on June 11.

2250s

• 2251: On March 4 at 10:52 UTC, Venus will occult Uranus.
• 2253: On August 1, Mercury occults Regulus (last occultation of Regulus by Mercury was on August 13, 364 BC).
• 2255: Transit of Venus on June 9.

2260s

• 2265: Return to perihelion by the Great Comet of 1861.

2270s

• 2279: Triple conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn.

2280s

• 2281, 2282: Grand trine of Uranus, Neptune, and Pluto. This last occurred in 1769 and 1770.
• 2284: Possible the perihelion of Halley's Comet might come back after the year 2209.
• 2285: Unless changes are made in the religious calendar, the Western Easter will fall on March 22 for the first time since 1818, the earliest possible date on which Easter can occur.[32]

2290s

For farther future dates, see Third millennium § Centuries and decades, List of millennia, and Timeline of the far future.

See also

• Timeline of world history
• 21st century in fiction
• Timelines of the future

Notes

References

1. Hale, Frank. "Periodical Cicadas". ag.tennessee.edu. Retrieved 2020-04-11.
2. "Tel Aviv light rail Red Line won't open next year". en.globes.co.il (in Hebrew). 2020-01-13. Retrieved 2020-04-11.
3. "NASA sets March 2021 Launch Date for James Webb Space Telescope". Sky & Telescope. 27 June 2018.
4. Jones, Andrew. "This Is China's New Spacecraft to Take Astronauts to the Moon (Photos)". Space.com.
5. "Beijing to host 2022 Winter Olympics and Paralympics". BBC Sport. 2015-07-31. Retrieved 2020-04-11.
6. Amos, Jonathan (2012-05-02). "ESA selects 1bn-euro Juice probe to Jupiter". BBC News. Retrieved 2020-04-11.
7. "Amir: 2022 World Cup Qatar a tournament for all Arabs". Gulf-Times (in Arabic). 2018-07-15. Retrieved 2020-04-11.
8. "2022 timeline contents". FutureTimeline.
9. "Better roads, rail travel and new river crossings in spending boost for London". London Evening Standard. 10 April 2012. Retrieved 12 November 2015.
10. Doctorow, Cory (2016-01-19). "We'll Probably Never Free Mickey, But That's Beside the Point". Electronic Frontier Foundation. Retrieved 2018-07-19.
11. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/09/18/spacex-japan-billionaire-yusaku-maezawa-first-tourist-to-fly-to-moon.html
12. "Denmark-Germany undersea Fehmarn tunnel gets go-ahead". BBC News. 25 July 2015. Retrieved 1 December 2015.
13. Taylor, Harriet (2016-06-02). "Musk: We intend to launch people to Mars in 2024, arrival in 2025". CNBC. Retrieved 2016-06-04.
14. "Magellan super-scope gets green light for construction". BBC News. 3 June 2015. Retrieved 1 December 2015.
15. "Square-kilometre radio telescope wins millions in UK funding". Theregister.co.uk. 13 March 2014. Retrieved 1 December 2015.
16. "Así será la Sagrada Família en 2026". ABC [digital version]. 26 September 2013.
17. Gibbs, Samuel (17 December 2014). "Is the Year 2038 problem the new Y2K bug?". The Guardian. Retrieved 6 January 2020.
18. Armstrong, Stuart; Sotala, Kaj. "How We're Predicting AI—or Failing To" (PDF).
19. "Kurzweil Claims That the Singularity Will Happen by 2045". Futurism. Retrieved 2019-11-24.
20. White, Edward; Lewis, Leo (15 August 2019). "South Korea's president seeks Korean unification by 2045". Financial Times. Retrieved 22 November 2019.
21. "State Forestry Administration,P.R.China". State Forestry Administration,P.R.China (in Chinese). Archived from the original on 15 March 2014. Retrieved 15 March 2014.
22. Meeus, Jean (1997). Mathematical Astronomy Morsels Ch.50. Willmann-Bell.
23. Kaye, Randi. "Jackie Kennedy's pink suit locked away from public view". CNN. Retrieved 2018-11-29.
24. "Catalog of Lunar Eclipses: 2101 to 2200". National Aeronautics and Space Administration. Retrieved 15 March 2014.
25. "Eclipse of June 25, 2150" (GIF). NASA Eclipse Web Site. Retrieved 15 March 2014.
26. "Solar eclipse of June 30, 1973". NASA Eclipse Web Site. Archived from the original (GIF) on July 20, 2012.
27. Nevans-Pederson, Mary (2008-03-13). "No St. Pat's Day Mass allowed in Holy Week". Dubuque Telegraph Herald. Woodward Communications, Inc. Archived from the original on 2008-10-16. Retrieved 2008-03-13.
28. "Eclipse of July 5, 2168". NASA Eclipse Web Site. Archived from the original (GIF) on June 28, 2012.
29. "Eclipse of July 16, 2186". NASA Eclipse Web Site. Archived from the original (GIF) on June 28, 2012.
30. "Saros 139". NASA Eclipse Web Site.
31. "NASA Eclipse Web Site". NASA Eclipse Web Site. Archived from the original on 2012-06-28.
32. "Selected Christian Observances". aa.usno.navy.mil. Archived from the original on January 2, 2013. Retrieved March 21, 2018.