YAOGAN-46

MilitaryMEOChina

YAOGAN-46 is a military satellite, as listed in Jonathan McDowell's GCAT catalogue, with ownership listed as China in CelesTrak's catalogue, currently in medium Earth orbit near 7,496 km. It completes one orbit of Earth roughly every 271 minutes at an inclination of 20.0°. It was launched in 2025. Track its live position and see when it passes over your location on azmth.

Orbital data

NORAD ID: 66313
COSPAR ID: 2025-250A
Type: Military
Orbit: MEO
Perigee (lowest): 7,496 km
Apogee (highest): 7,511 km
Inclination: 20.04°
Orbital period: 271 min
Launch year: 2025
Owner (CelesTrak): China

Orbital data updated: 2026-10-18 · from CelesTrak, refreshed every 2 hours.

Who operates it

ChinaLIVEActive

Optical imaging

Official description

“The Yaogan-46 satellite is mainly used for disaster prevention and mitigation, land resource surveying, water conservancy and meteorology and similar fields.”

Xinhua, 3 Nov 2025

azmth's translation · Show original

遥感四十六号卫星主要用于防灾减灾、国土资源勘察、水利气象等领域。

Independent assessment

GCAT classes it as a military satellite for optical imaging and records it as active (17 Oct 2026).

Data: GCAT · CC BY 4.0 Class, mission and status adapted from GCAT by Jonathan McDowell, CC BY 4.0, data update 17 Oct 2026.

Military satellites, counted and explained →

About MEO orbit

Medium Earth Orbit. Between 2,000 and 35,786 km. Home to navigation constellations like GPS (~20,200 km), Galileo, and BeiDou. Orbital period 2 to 24 hours.