*Contains spoilers for all Star Trek television shows and movies*
Last updated: December 2022
“It’s been a long road, getting from there to here.”
What makes Star Trek so special? Is it the fun characters and cool spaceships? For some it probably is. Is is the deep and often meaningful stories that we can use to better ourselves? Almost certainly. Is it because of Leola root? Probably not.
What makes Star Trek special, for me anyway, is the way its shows and movies have collectively formed a single, mostly cohesive timeline that nicely connects, and intersects, with our own history. Star Trek is aspirational. It’s a dreamer’s roadmap, an optimist’s blueprint.
So, how did we get here? Or perhaps for anyone reading this in 2022, how are we going to get there?
20th Century
1903: In North Carolina on Earth, the Wright brothers conduct the first-ever powered manned flight by Humans.
1947: Reports of a UFO crash near Roswell, New Mexico dismissed by the US government.
1957: Sputnik 1 becomes the first Human-made satellite to be launched into Earth’s orbit.
1958: NASA founded.
1969: Apollo 11 lands on the Moon.
1986: Dr. Gillian Taylor of the Cetacean Institute in Sausalito, California, protects, exhibits and studies two Humpback whales, George & Gracie, a Terran endangered species. Meanwhile Dr. Nichols of Plexicorp invents transparent aluminum.
1993: A group of genetically-engineered “supermen” lead by Khan Noonien Singh begin the Eugenics Wars, a conflict which claims the lives of 30 million humans.
1996: Khan and followers defeated, ending the Eugenics Wars. Khan flees Earth in the SS Botany Bay.
1999: Voyager 6 probe launched, but disappears in what we once called a black hole.
21st Century
2024: The Bell Riots take place in San Francisco. One of the most violent civil disturbances in American history, the riots and subsequent crackdown resulted in the deaths of hundreds of Sanctuary District residents.
2026: World War III begins over, among other things, the issue of genetic manipulation, a fallout from the Eugenics Wars 30 years prior.
2053: World War III comes to and end following a nuclear holocaust which kills over 600 million humans, leaving the planet devastated with little governments remaining.
April 5th 2063: Zefram Cochrane invents warp drive. His first test flight draws the attention of a group of Vulcans studying in the Sol system, who immediately initiate First Contact with Earth.
22nd Century
2103: First colonies established on Mars.
2113: War, poverty, disease, and hunger virtually eliminated on Earth.
2143: Humans break warp 2 barrier as part of the Warp Five and NX Programs.
2151: First contact with the Klingons. The Enterprise NX-01, humanity’s first Warp 5 capable ship under the command of Captain Jonathan Archer, fast-tracked to launch on a mission to Kronos.
2153: Xindi crisis begins with an attack on Earth costing the lives of seven million people. The Enterprise enters the Delphic Expanse in a successful, year-long mission to make contact with the Xindi and prevent further attacks. Delphic Expanse revealed as fabricated and destroyed as part of events.
2154: Syrrannites led by T’Pau overthrow Romulan-influenced government on Vulcan. Vulcan later forms an alliance with Earth, Andoria, and Tellar.
2156: The Earth-Romulan Wars, Earth’s first major interstellar conflict, begins following Romulan efforts to destabilize the local region.
2160: The Earth-Romulan War ends with the Romulans’ humiliating defeat at the Battle of Cheron. Victory was achieved by an alliance of Earth, Vulcan, Andorian, and Tellarite forces.
2161: Earth, Vulcan, Andoria, and Tellar found the United Federation of Planets in San Francisco. The Enterprise NX-01 decommissioned after a decade of service. USS Franklin disappears and is presumed lost.
23rd Century
2223: Tense relations between the Federation and the Klingon Empire continue to degenerate, starting a cold war.
In The Kelvin Timeline…
2233: The USS Kelvin is destroyed battling an unknown force. George Kirk saves most of the crew, including newly born son, James Kirk, but dies doing so.
2258: Prime Universe Spock arrives and is captured by the displaced Romulan mining ship, Narada. Narada uses experimental red matter to destroy Vulcan. The crew of the newly-launched USS Enterprise, led by Cadet Kirk and Commander Spock defeat the Narada, preventing Earth’s destruction. Kirk immediately promoted to Captain and given command of the Enterprise with Spock as first officer.
2259: Khan Noonien Singh woken by Admiral Marcus in an effort to wage war against the Klingon Empire. Khan rebels but is ultimately arrested by the Enterprise crew and returned to cryogenic sleep.
2263: Enterprise attacked and destroyed at Altamid by Krall and his Swarm ships. Krall, revealed as Captain of the long-lost USS Franklin, eventually apprehended and killed attempting to unleash energy weapon at the Yorktown. Enterprise NCC-1701-A launched with Kirk as Captain once again. Prime Universe Spock dies.
Back In The Prime Timeline…
2245: The USS Enterprise NCC-1701 is launched with Robert April as Captain.
2250: Robert April replaced as Enterprise Captain by Christopher Pike.
2254: Spock joins the Enterprise as Science Officer. The Enterprise encounters the Talosians on Talos IV after which travel to and interaction with the planet is strictly forbidden under General Order 7.
2256: Open war between the Federation and the Klingon Empire breaks out following the Battle at the Binary stars. Commander Michael Burnham blamed for the conflict due to her attempted mutiny aboard the Shenzhou. Captain Phillipa Georgiou and Klingon faction leader T’Kuvma killed during the opening battle.
2257: L’Rell unites the Klingon Empire, ending the bloody conflict with the Federation. USS Discovery neutralises AI threat, but disappears soon after in a singularity with all hands presumed lost. Burnham, Discovery and crew are struck from all records.
2265: Pike promoted to Fleet Admiral, replaced as Enterprise Captain by James T. Kirk.
2266: The Romulan Star Empire emerges following nearly a century of isolation and engages in a series of unprovoked attacks on several outposts along the Federation-Romulan Neutral Zone. During the incident, the first visual contact of the previously unseen Romulans are made, revealing them to be an offshoot of the Vulcans.
2267: The Federation and Klingon Empire relations improve with the signing of the Treaty of Organia. The two powers, along with the Romulan Star Empire, establish a “colony of galactic peace” on Nimbus III. SS Botany Bay found adrift with Khan and followers alive, frozen in cryogenic sleep. Awoke, Khan attempts to take the Enterprise but is thwarted and exiled to Ceti Alpha V.
c.2269: Enterprise completes 5-year mission. James Kirk promoted to Chief of Starfleet Operations. Enterprise returns to Earth for extensive refit.
c.2271: Refit Enterprise rushed into service to engage an unknown intruder on a course for Earth. Enterprise Captain Will Deckard demoted and replaced by Admiral Kirk. Intruder is revealed as V’Ger, an evolved form of the Voyager 6 probe. V’Ger evolves again, merging with Deckard and assuming a new form. Enterprise under Kirk’s command begins a new 5-year mission.
2285: Khan escapes exile on Ceti Alpha V and commandeers the USS Reliant. Attacks the Enterprise under the temporary command of Admiral Kirk. Khan learns of the development of the Genesis Device and following his defeat during the Battle of the Mutara Nebula successfully detonates the device, resulting in the formation of the first artificially-created planet. Spock dies during conflict to save the Enterprise, his body laid to rest on the newly formed planet.
The new planet immediately causes intergalactic controversy. Klingon commander Kruge travels to the planet to learn its secrets, destroying a research vessel. The Enterprise is stolen and later destroyed by Kirk in a successful mission to retrieve Spock’s body, regenerated by the now unstable and doomed planet. Kirk, the crew and Spock defeat Kruge, capture his bird of prey and escape the planet, heading to Vulcan to restore Spock’s Katra.
2286: An alien probe of unknown origin reaches Earth, evaporating the planet’s oceans. Kirk and the crew of the captured Bird of Prey leave Vulcan, learn the probe is attempting to communicate with now extinct Humpback Whales, and travel back to 1986 to obtain a pair. The mission is successful and Earth is saved. Kirk demoted to Captain and assigned to command the new Enterprise NCC-1701-A.
2287: Enterprise captured at Nimbus III by Sybok, who takes the ship to the heart of the galaxy to meet “God”. The plan fails and the crew quickly return to shore leave.
2293: Praxis explodes, forcing peace talks between the Federation and the Klingon Empire. Klingon Chancellor Gorkon assassinated en route to talks by opponents of the peace who successfully frame Kirk for the crime. Kirk and Doctor McCoy sentenced to life on the penal colony Rura Penthe but later rescued by Spock and the Enterprise. The Enterprise and The Excelsior, captained by Sulu prevent further disruptions, allowing the signing of the Khitomer Accords, establishing a lasting peace between the two powers. Events are the final actions of the Enterprise and her crew, with the ship decommissioned shortly thereafter.
The Enterprise NCC-1701-B, under the command of Captain Harriman, launched with Kirk, Montgomery Scott and Pavel Chekov in attendance for the maiden voyage. During the cruise ship answers a distress call from El-Aurian refugee ships caught in a temporal nexus. 57 refugees, including Guinan and Doctor Soran are saved, but Kirk is swept into space and presumed lost.
24th Century
2344: Federation vessel USS Enterprise NCC-1701-C, under the command of Captain Rachel Garratt destroyed at the Battle of Narendra III while defending a Klingon colony against Romulan attackers. The crew’s sacrifice is regarded by the Klingons as an honourable act and cements the alliance with the Federation.
2364: The USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D, under the command of Captain Jean Luc Picard, launched. Encounters omnipotent being Q, who tries and fails to convict humanity for the crimes of being “an aggressively savage child race”.
Enterprise and crew break warp velocity, briefly becoming the first humans to leave the Milky Way Galaxy.
Enterprise and crew discover and successfully thwart a subtle attempt by parasitic beings to take full control of Starfleet and an all-out invasion of the Federation.
2365: Q facilitates the Federation’s first contact with the Borg. 19 crew are lost during the initial exchange in system J-25.
2367: The Borg begin an invasion of Federation space and assimilate Captain Picard. Starfleet engage the Borg cube during the disastrous Battle of Wolf 359. Over 10,000 lives are lost, including Benjamin Sisko’s wife, Jennifer, aboard the USS Saratoga. The Enterprise, under the command of Captain Riker, successfully rescue Picard from the Borg, and neutralises the threat at the last minute. Picard resumes command but is left traumatised by the events.
2368: Romulan-influenced Klingon Civil War begins, but is quickly brought to an end following Federation interference. The Romulan Sela is revealed as the child of Tasha Yar, the Enterprise’s deceased tactical officer, inexplicably captured during the Battle of Narendra III.
2369: Terak Nor, a former Cardassian station orbiting formerly occupied Bajor, occupied by joint Federation-Bajoran forces under the command of Commander Benjamin Sisko. Renamed Deep Space Nine. Bajoran Wormhole is soon discovered, representing a secure link between the Alpha and Gamma Quadrants. Deep Space Nine manoeuvred closer to the wormhole to protect against Cardassian forces.
2370: The Federation signs a treaty with the Cardassian Union, establishing a Demilitarized Zone along their shared borders. Several Federation colonists, opposed to the treaty, as well as several sympathetic Starfleet officers, organize an armed resistance called the Maquis and carry out a series of attacks on key Cardassian military targets.
2371: The USS Voyager, under the command of Captain Kathryn Janeway, sets off on a mission to locate the Maquis ship Val Jean, but is pulled into the Delta Quadrant by the Caretaker. Effectively stranded seventy-five years from Federation space, Voyager aligns with the former crew of the Val Jean and begins its long journey back home.
First contact with the Dominion and the Founders in the Gamma Quadrant leads to several attempts by the group to destabilize key groups in the Alpha Quadrant. During this, the Klingons withdraw from the Khitomer Accords and re-enter a period of hostilities with the Federation. Founders also manipulate key members of Starfleet into a failed coup against the Federation President which nearly results in civil war.
The Enterprise-D is destroyed at Viridian III attempting to prevent Doctor Soran from destroying the system’s star. Soran is initially successful, but trapped in the same temporal nexus that occurred nearly a century prior, Captain Picard enlists the previously lost Captain Kirk to successfully defeat Soran and prevent the star’s destruction. Kirk dies during the encounter and is buried at the scene.
Benjamin Sisko promoted to Captain.
c.2372: The state-of-the-art USS Enterprise NCC-1701-E launched under the command of Captain Picard and the majority of the crew of the previous ship.
A malfunction on the Ferengi Quark’s ship causes Quark, Rom, and Nog to crash in the year 1947 in Roswell, New Mexico.
2373: Second Borg invasion of Federation space culminates in the Battle of Sector 001. Starfleet once again suffer heavy losses but are successful in destroying the Borg cube thanks to the arrival of Captain Picard and the Enterprise-E. The Enterprise-E follow a Borg cube back to 2063 and successfully thwarts the Borg’s plans to prevent First Contact with the Vulcans. Key members of the senior crew assist Zefram Cochrane with his historic flight.
The Cardassian Union joins The Dominion and later helps conquer Deep Space Nine, igniting the Dominion War.
The Khitomer Accords are restored, ending a brief, but violent Federation-Klingon conflict.
In the Delta Quadrant Captain Janeway and Voyager enter into a brief alliance with the Borg to combat and defeat Species 8472, a dangerous force invading from their home realm in fluidic space. The Borg then attempt to assimilate Voyager, but are thwarted by Janeway who successfully severs former human Seven of Nine from the collective in the process.
2374: Combined Starfleet and Klingon forces successfully retake Deep Space Nine. Captain Sisko, with the assistance of former Cardassian spy Garak, assassinates a high-ranking Romulan ambassador and successfully frames The Dominion, prompting the Romulan Star Empire to join the war against The Dominion. Sisko grapples with the morality of his choices but deletes the incriminating official log entry.
Voyager encounters the Krenim Imperium without incident. Nothing to see here.
Voyager later re-establishes contact with the Federation using a Hirogen relay station. Project Pathfinder is commissioned to return the ship home.
2375: The Cardassian Union turns against The Dominion now occupying Cardassia Prime and aligns with Federation-Klingon-Romulan forces. The Dominion War ends with the signing of the Treaty of Bajor, but The Cardassian Union suffers significant losses during the final battle. Captain Sisko, last seen heading into the fire caves on Bajor, disappears and is declared missing.
Captain Picard and the Enterprise-E lead a successful insurrection against allied Starfleet-Son’a forces after discovering hidden plans to relocate 600 non-indigenous Ba’Ku residents on a planet in the Briar patch with regenerative properties. Several boobs briefly firm up, and Worf revisits Klingon puberty.
2378: Voyager returns to Earth following a seven-year absence in the Delta Quadrant. Kathryn Janeway promoted to Admiral.
2379: The government of the Romulan Empire is overthrown by Shinzon as the head of a Reman coup and makes a false peace offer to the Federation. Admiral Janeway assigns Captain Picard and the Enterprise-E to head to Romulus to investigate. Shinzon is revealed as a clone of Picard, on a mission to kill Picard and wipe out all life on Earth with thalaron radiation. The Enterprise and Shinzon’s ship, The Scimitar engage in the Battle of the Basin Rift which causes significant damage to both ships as well as several Romulan ships assisting the Enterprise. Picard kills Shizon and is saved by Commander Data who sacrifices himself to save the Enterprise.
Key members of the Enterprise’s senior crew are reassigned, including a promoted Captain Riker and Commander Troi. The Federation begins peace talks with the new Romulan government.
Around this time the Betelgeusian time soldier Yor becomes the first known person to successfully travel to the Prime timeline from the Kelvin timeline. They Infiltrate Starfleet but is eventually euthanized due to severe medical complications from the jump between realities.
c.2385: Romulan star goes supernova.
2385: Rogue synths launch an attack on Mars, destroying the Utopia Planitia Fleet Yards. Starfleet abandons plans to aid the evacuation of the Romulan system. The Federation places a galactic-wide ban on all synthetics. Now Admiral Jean-Luc Picard resigns from his commission in protest and returns to civilian life in France.
2387: Ambassador Spock attempts, but fails to save Romulus from the supernova using experimental red matter. Nero of the Romulan Mining ship Narada swears revenge but during his confrontation with Spock, both are pulled into a singularity and are declared missing. This event unbeknownst to anyone results in the Kelvin Timeline.
2399: Jean-Luc Picard and the crew of the La Sirena save an android community from Zhat Vash-Romulan forces who believe synths will lead to a universal AI apocalypse. Picard dies but is later resurrected in the body of an artificial golem. The Federation lifts the ban on synthetic lifeforms.
29th Century
c.2875: The time ship Relativity, under the command of Captain Braxton, recruits Seven of Nine to uncover a saboteur responsible for destroying Voyager.. Braxton himself is revealed to be the person responsible and is successfully apprehended by Captain Janeway.
30th Century
2958: Dilithium supplies begin to dry up. The Federation begins to trial alternate warp drive designs.
31st Century
c.3052: Temporal agent Daniels involves Captain Archer in a fast-escalating temporal cold war.
c.3064: The Kelpian Research Vessel Khi’eth, investigating a potential “dilithium nursery” in the Verubin Nebula, crash lands on an astronomical body at the centre of the nebula.
c.3069: Most of the galaxy’s dilithium becomes inert in what becomes known as The Burn. Millions die when countless starships lose antimatter containment and are destroyed by warp core breaches. Without dilithium, the Federation begins to fall apart as member planets separate from the coalition.
c.3074: In the Delta Quadrant a backup copy of Voyager’s EMH is activated by a Kyrian historian. The Doctor corrects a distorted view of Voyager in Kyrian history, helping bridge the gulf between Kyrian and Vaskan races. Years later the EMH heads back to the Alpha Quadrant to find out what happened to Voyager and his crewmates.
c.3089: Earth leaves the Federation. Starfleet and the Federation leave a rapidly splintering Sol System and set up a new base of operations somewhere in the Alpha Quadrant.
32nd Century
3188: Michael Burnham emerges from the singularity and meets Cleveland Booker on Hima.
3189: The Discovery emerges from the singularity and reunites with Burnham, who is now living as a courier with Booker. Burnham and the Discovery solve the mystery of the Burn and defeat Osyraa and the Emerald Chain. Burnham is promoted to Captain and the Discovery is tasked with distributing dilithium and forging new relationships for a rejuvenated Federation, thriving once again.
