NISAR launched July 30, 2025, and has been successfully collecting data through its Commissioning phase and into the Science phase. The calibration-validation process is underway, and a selection of pre-calibration L-band data generated from NISAR acquisitions is available to the public.
In addition, a limited set of NISAR S-band sample data products can now be accessed through ISRO’s Bhoonidhi data hub. This S-band product release includes RSLC, GSLC, and GCOV products generated from NISAR acquisitions in January and February 2026. Refer to the Bhoonidhi NISAR Mission site for more information.
NISAR Pre-Calibration Data: February 2026¶
A selection of pre-calibration NISAR L-band Level-1 to Level-3 products are available through the ASF DAAC. This large volume of global data allows users to develop workflows to access the data and metadata for each product type, to become familiar with the characteristics of the L-band products, and to begin working with the data in a substantive way.
The user community can prepare for managing NISAR’s large data volumes and refine their processing pipelines in anticipation of full global production and release of calibrated data in July 2026. Users will find a rich and unprecedented collection of polarimetric and interferometric products to explore, with fine resolution, accurate geolocation, and full of bio/geophysical features.
Product Availability¶
The February 2026 release of NISAR L-band pre-calibration data includes a global dataset, representative of the final product distribution of all NISAR products. All Level-1 to Level-3 L-band product types are available.
This release includes data acquired between October 17, 2025 and January 20, 2026. This includes up to 8 acquisitions per track (both ascending and descending). Figure 1 displays the spatial extent of the data included in this release. For a more detailed acquisition map, see the interactive NISAR February 2026 Released Data map.
Figure 1:Spatial distribution of the archived pre-calibration NISAR data products, highlighted in green, included in the February 2026 data release.
Basemap credits: Esri, TomTom, Garmin, FAO, NOAA, USGS, (c) OpenStreetMap contributors, and the GIS User Community.
Known Issues¶
A new instrument producing global data products for the first time will necessitate optimization of the products over time. In addition, the NISAR project is still in the calibration and validation phase, and these products are not yet fully calibrated. Nonetheless, the data are expected to be of sufficient quality that most users will benefit from an early look at the products.
See Pre-Calibration Product Known Issues for a list of known issues reported for the current data release.
Fully calibrated and algorithmically improved global L-band products are expected to be available starting July 2026.
L-Band Data Release Timeline¶
NISAR has continually collected L-band data over nearly all global landmasses since August 2025. Figure 2 shows the spatial extent of the collected data. The NISAR Reference Observation Plan provides a more detailed, interactive map of NISAR data acquisitions.
Figure 2:Spatial extent of NISAR L-band data collection, highlighted in green. Basemap credits: Esri, TomTom, Garmin, FAO, NOAA, USGS, (c) OpenStreetMap contributors, and the GIS User Community.
All L-band data products processed by the mission will be available to the public through the Alaska Satellite Facility.
The nominal data release timeline as of July 2026 is described below.
Jan 2026: Sample products¶
An initial release of 25 pre-calibration sample data products were made available on January 23, 2026. This release included one or more products of each of the nine Level 1-3 product types.
Feb 2026: Pre-calibration products¶
A larger volume of pre-calibration global data products were made available on February 27, 2026. This release included over 100,000 Level 1-3 products totaling over 500 TB of science data. These datasets are marked as BETA, as they are not yet fully calibrated.
Jul 2026: Provisional forward processing¶
After the calibration phase concludes and planned software improvements are completed, the NISAR project will begin forward processing of newly-acquired data. These datasets will be marked as PROVISIONAL, indicating that they are calibrated and partially validated, but processing improvements are still underway. Provisional datasets will be released in the second half of July 2026, including all acquisitions starting from June 17, 2026.
This release will be the first to include L0B RRSD products, which will have a nominal latency of 2-10 hours from data acquisition to availability. Level 1-3 products will have a nominal latency of 36-72 hours. Products will be continuously generated and made publicly available for all areas shown in Figure 2 and in the NISAR Reference Observation Plan.
Q4 2026: Validated reprocessing¶
After the start of forward processing, additional validation will take place using the provisional data, resulting in algorithm improvements. Once the products are fully validated, the NISAR project will transition to generating validated products with a new version of the processor and begin a reprocessing campaign. These validated products will supersede any earlier versions of the data in the archive.
This reprocessing campaign will generate new versions of Level 0-3 products from the global backlog of all L-band data collected during the science phase of the mission. Data products will be continually published to ASF and made publicly available as they are generated during the reprocessing effort, which is expected to be complete by the end of 2026.