Retired EVA workhorse to guide China's next-gen spacesuit and lunar gear

by Riko Seibo
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Jan 21, 2026

Chinese engineers are turning a long-serving spacewalk suit into a real-world testbed to extend the life and performance of China's next-generation EVA and lunar spacesuits.

The retired "extravehicular spacesuit B," recently returned to Earth aboard the uncrewed Shenzhou XX capsule after supporting 20 spacewalks on the Tiangong station, will now be subjected to detailed inspections, tests and material analyses to feed directly into future suit upgrades.

Officials say the suit carries extremely high scientific research value and commemorative significance, having logged four years of hard service in orbit and becoming the first of China's current-generation EVA suits to hit its extended life target.

Engineering teams plan to mine the suit for firsthand data on how its fabrics, seals, joints and life-support hardware actually aged under real orbital conditions, information that is difficult to generate convincingly in ground-based chambers alone.

Those results are expected to guide new in-orbit life extension strategies, tighten reliability margins and shape design optimizations for follow-on EVA suits that will be called on to support more frequent and longer-duration spacewalks.

Insights from suit B will also be fed into the development pipeline for China's dedicated lunar spacesuit, intended to protect astronauts on future Moon-landing missions where dust, extreme temperature swings and reduced gravity present a different suite of hazards than low Earth orbit.

The suit was originally delivered to Tiangong by cargo ship Tianzhou 2 in May 2021 and first saw action during the Shenzhou XII crew's debut spacewalk in July 2021, which also marked the first EVA conducted outside the Chinese space station.

Over its career it was used by 11 astronauts across eight crewed missions, supporting assembly, maintenance and test operations that included installing a large robotic arm and other external equipment while validating the suit's performance envelope.

On Aug. 15, the workhorse was donned for the final time by Chen Dong, commander of the Shenzhou XX crew, during the team's third spacewalk, effectively closing out its on-orbit service record.

Chen, who has six EVAs to his name and used the suit more than any other taikonaut, described a strong personal bond with the garment, recalling that from the moment he wrote his name on its back he felt responsible for caring for it as it protected him outside the station.

Earlier reports noted that each of China's first three EVA suits weighs around 120 kilograms, incorporates advanced safety features and costs on the order of 30 million yuan, underscoring the motivation to stretch their usable lifetimes while maintaining strict safety margins.

In July, two new-generation spacewalk suits were delivered to Tiangong aboard the Tianzhou 9 cargo freighter, featuring optimized designs, longer rated lifespans and the ability to support more EVAs as China gears up for more intensive station operations and eventual crewed exploration of the Moon.