The data released in DR5 are the final VLT Survey Telescope (VST) ATLAS stacked images and associated source lists taken from observations by VST from October 2017 to the end of the survey in January 2021 under ESO program ID 177.A-3011. These new data mainly comprise the ATLAS NGC extension at Dec<-20 deg. DR5 presents new and updated CASU (Cambridge Astronomical Survey Unit) images and source lists and also a full re-release of multi-band catalogue data from the Wide Field Astronomy Unit (WFAU) at Edinburgh, representing the "best" data. Any other un-updated data is still available within DR4 and earlier releases. DR5 data also includes the final ATLAS global photometry calibration.

The ALMA Observatory is delighted to announce that Cycle 11 has set a new all-time record in the number of science-quality observing hours (QA0 PASS observations) delivered across all three arrays. During Cycle 11, ALMA successfully acquired a total of 4,496 hours of science-quality data with the 12-m Array, surpassing for the first time the ambitious goal of 4,300 hours offered. In addition, 4,201 hours were delivered with the 7-m Array, and 3,240 hours with the Total Power Array.

The Council of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) has appointed Andreas Kaufer to be the new ESO Director General. Kaufer, who is currently ESO Director of Operations, will succeed Xavier Barcons, who will remain as Director General until the end of August 2026.

On 18 October 2025, the 4-metre Multi-Object Spectroscopic Telescope (4MOST) facility, installed on the VISTA telescope at the Paranal Observatory, obtained its first light. This is a crucial milestone towards the start of scientific observations with this new spectroscopic facility. The First Light observations exemplify the unique capabilities of 4MOST. They covered an area of the sky containing the Sculptor Galaxy and the NGC288 star cluster showing 4MOST ability to observe a very large field of view and its capability to get spectra for many very different objects and science cases simultaneously.

ESO received 1285 valid proposals for observations in Period 117 (1 May 2026 - 30 April 2027). The deadline for proposal submission was 23 September 2025. The time request (in hours) on ESO Proposals (blue), for Paranal (VLT/I) (orange), La Silla (green), APEX (red) is shown in the figure above. The time request in P117 has roughly doubled with respect to previous Periods, while the number of proposals increased by about 40%. On the VLT, the most demanded ESO instrument was ESPRESSO with a request of 5846 hours, followed by MUSE (5519 hours), and XSHOOTER (5086) hours. HARPS/NIRPS on the ESO 3.6 metre telescope was the most demanded instrument at La Silla, with a combined request of 4985 hours.

The VLT Survey Telescope (VST) at Paranal is now owned and operated by INAF, which is responsible for processing the data and releasing them via the ESO Archive. The imaging data included in the current DR2 were obtained using the wide-field camera OmegaCAM with the g, r, i, and z filters and belong to the projects "Pre-supernova Outbursts in Galactic Red Supergiants: Predicting the Next Galactic SN Event" (GALRSG, P.I. F. Bocchino, PROG_ID: 113.26YN.001) and "VST Survey of Mass Assembly and Structural Hierarchy" (VST-SMASH, P.I. C. Tortora, PROG_ID: 110.25AA.001)

This data release presents the first millimetre spectroscopic imaging of the Orion Nebula obtained with the CONCERTO instrument on the APEX telescope. The observations were carried out on 24 August 2022 under ESO programme 110.A-4194 (110.23NK; PI Désert) in excellent atmospheric conditions (pwv ≈ 0.4 mm). The dataset covers 0.5 deg² centred on the Orion Nebula (M42), spanning the frequency range 130–310 GHz (0.97–2.3 mm) at a typical angular resolution of 27″ and a spectral resolution of 6 GHz (sampled at 3 GHz). 

This data release presents the first instalment of the SEDIGISM (Structure, Excitation and Dynamics of the Inner Galactic Interstellar Medium) survey, a large spectroscopic programme mapping molecular gas across the inner Milky Way. The survey was conducted with the APEX 12-m telescope between 2013 and 2017 and covers approximately 84 deg² of the southern Galactic plane, with continuous coverage from −60° ≤ l ≤ +17° at |b| ≤ 0.5°. Additional regions extend the latitude coverage (e.g. towards the Central Molecular Zone, RCW 120, and the Nessie filament) and include a dedicated 2 deg² field around W43 for cross-comparison with northern surveys.

The ESO Data Processing System (EDPS) is a new system to run the ESO data reduction pipelines. It will replace EsoReflex as the recommended way to process ESO raw data in 2026. An Alpha version of the Graphical User Interface has been released and can be used to run ESO pipelines for any of the currently active VLT instruments. While the documentation is still incomplete, the software itself is fully functional. It is significantly more performant than EsoReflex, and in some cases delivers better results due to better data organisation, default setup or workflow. ESO encourages the use of the EDPS GUI for new data reduction projects. Requests for support or any feedback can be submitted via the ESO support page.

ESO is extending the deadline for abstract submission for the conference "VLT beyond 2030" to 26 September 2025. The meeting will take place in Garching near Munich (Germany) and virtually on 26-30 January 2026.