- 1 October 2003 – The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency is formed from a merger of three previous Japanese space agencies
- 4 October 1957 – The first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, is launched into orbit by the Soviet Union, triggering the Space Race
- 5 October 2012 – CSIRO's Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope, which detected the first Odd radio circle in 2019, has its first light.
- 15 October 1997 – The Cassini space probe launches and is active in space for nearly 20 years
- 15 October 2003 – The People's Republic of China becomes the third nation to send a human into space when Yang Liwei is launched into outer space aboard Shenzhou 5
- 24 October 1946 – First motion pictures of Earth are taken from a V-2 rocket
- 29 October 1991 – Galileo probe flyby of Asteroid Gaspra
- 31 October 1961 – Murriyang, CSIRO's 64 m Parkes radio telescope at the Parkes Observatory on Wiradjuri Country in NSW, was inaugurated.
