Spaceflight participant

Space flight participant (Russian: Участник космического полёта, uchastnik kosmicheskogo polyota) is the term used by the U.S. National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the Russian Federal Space Agency (RKA), and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for people who travel into space, but who are not professional astronauts.

While the term gained new prominence with the rise of space tourism, it has also been used for participants in programs like NASA's Teacher in Space and astronauts designated by inter-government agreements like the Angkasawan program and the Korean Astronaut Program.

Other terms used for space travelers who are not career astronauts include NASA's Payload Specialist and the RKA's Researcher-Cosmonaut.

The Soviet Interkosmos program included participants selected from Warsaw Pact members and later from allies of the USSR and non-aligned countries. Most of these people received full training for their missions and were treated as equals, but especially after the Mir program began, were generally given shorter flights than Soviet cosmonauts. The European Space Agency took advantage of the program as well.

The United States Space Shuttle program included Payload Specialist positions which were usually filled by representatives of companies or institutions managing a specific payload on that mission. These individuals did not receive the same level of training as career NASA astronauts and were not employed by NASA, so they were essentially private astronauts.

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