NASA’s new rover prototype drove 16 miles in a week, 10 times faster than anything it has on Mars

Curiosity has spent 14 years crawling across Mars, covering about 21 miles. A new NASA prototype nearly matched that distance in a single week.

ERNEST, which stands for Exploration Rover for Navigating Extreme Sloped Terrain, logged 16 miles in 37 hours during a March 2026 field test in California's Colorado Desert, reaching speeds of 0.6 miles per hour. That's roughly 10 times faster than any rover currently operating on Mars.

What makes ERNEST different isn't just speed. Its active suspension system can lift individual wheels over obstacles, drive sideways, and switch between movement modes including what JPL describes as "squirming." It also uses AI trained through thousands of virtual driving hours, reducing its dependence on commands from Earth.

NASA's Mars Exploration Program is now funding the project, and team leaders say a larger version could eventually support lunar missions, particularly near the south pole, where water ice may exist and operational windows are short.

ERNEST is still a prototype. But it's a prototype that's quietly rewriting expectations.