Happy holidays from ESA's Hera asteroid mission for planetary defence, currently cruising through deep space on its way towards a swingby of Mars next March.

This Christmas you can enjoy two free gifts from Hera. Have a go talking to the mission 'directly' via the online Hera Space Companion, an interactive AI-powered assistant providing facts about the mission and real-time data from space. The Hera Space Companion has been developed by Terra Mater Studios, Impact AI, and Microsoft Austria in collaboration with ESA.

And anyone who owns an Apple Vision Pro or Meta Quest 3 or 3S VR headset can have the Hera spacecraft turn up in their own living room!

Developed by Italian startup DIVE in cooperation with ESA’s Hera mission team, the “Guardians of Earth” app allows users to peer inside the spacecraft, learn about how it works, assemble its elements and follow its journey through space to its target asteroid. From today, the app is available for free on Apple Vision Pro from the App Store and for Meta Quest 3 and 3S.

To find out more about Hera and its CubeSat companions, watch our Incredible Adventures of the Hera Mission cartoon series!