Whether students are beginners or more advanced at coding, there is a place for them in the European Astro Pi Challenge. The UK Space Agency and the European Space agency are offering the challenge to students up to age 19 with different levels of coding competency.

Beginners are invited to participate in the Astro Pi Mission Zero by designing a piece of pixel art for display to astronauts aboard the ISS on Raspberry Pi computers known as Astro Pis. Students capable of handling more complex code - in this case, programming in Python - are asked to be part of the Mission Space Lab instead. Their challenge is to calculate the speed of the ISS by utilising sensors or a camera with the Astro Pi.

Mission Zero's deadline is the 23rd March 2026 and Mission Space Lab's deadline is 16 February 2026. Resources are being provided to the Educators by the project.

Astro Pi's ambassador is ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot, KJ5LTN, who will be undertaking her first mission to the ISS in early 2026.