This is where every Starfleet adventure begins: Star Fleet Academy. The future never looked so enticing.

Starfleet cadets navigate friendships, rivalries, and first loves while training to become officers. They face a new threat endangering the Academy and Federation.

Created by Alex Kurtzman and Noga Landau, Starfleet Academy features cadets from every species and civilization in the Federation. We see humans, of course, and some that can pass for human at a distance.

And some that are only humanoid. There are probably some that aren’t even human-shaped, but we shall see what the future holds.

Holly Hunter plays Captain Nahla Ake, the school’s chancellor and captain of the USS Athena. She greets the new class of cadets, and we get to see them in their first days on the campus of the Academy outside of San Francisco. The series is set in the 32nd century after the events of Star Trek: Discovery, and it’s the first time the Federation has been on Earth in 120 years.

“We look at the generation now that is inheriting all of this division and all these major issues,” executive producer Alex Kurtzman said on the Hall H stage at 2025’s San Diego Comic-Con. “We wanted to create a show that anchored us back to [Gene] Rodneyberry’s essential vision of hope. How do you find it, how do you rebuild it?”

Actress Holly Hunter spoke as well, on the same stage: “It was really interesting to get the offer to be the captain, but then also to combine that with being the chancellor,” Hunter said. “The captain is there to analyze in emergency situations, and then to delegate. And the chancellor is there to guide, to collaborate and to have tremendous empathy. It was just a wonderful combination of things.”

The main cadets on the show were also in attendance, and revealed as:

 • Caleb Mir (Sandro Rosta), “an orphan with a troubled past, and unlikely Starfleet cadet.” Rosta said that Caleb is “disillusioned” with Starfleet, but his journey to find his mother brings him into Starfleet Academy due to his connection to Nahla. “You’re going to be entering a Starfleet through the eyes of Caleb, who is an outsider,” he said.

• Jay-Den Kraag (Karim Diané), “a Klingon cadet who dreams of becoming a medical officer.” Diané said at first it took him five hours a day to put on the prosthetics to play the character, which was ultimately cut down to two hours by the end of the first season. He reached out to “Trek” alumni Michael Dorn (Worf on “Star Trek: The Next Generation”) and Doug Jones (Saru on “Discovery”) for advice on performing with so much makeup. “I just had so much support from everyone around me that made this process really seamless,” he said.

• Series Acclimation Mil (Kerrice Brooks), aka Sam, “the first of her kind to ever attend Starfleet Academy.” In the panel, Brooks — who was overcome with tears after seeing the trailer for the first time — explained that Sam is Kasqian, which is apparently another name for a hologram. “She was literally only created, like, weeks ago,” she said. “She brings absolutely no baggage. She brings such a freshness and a levity to so many things.”

• Darem Reymi (George Hawkins), “an aspiring captain from a wealthy home world.” “He comes from status and he comes from a lot of expectation,” Hawkins said on stage. “So when he comes to the Academy and he meets cadets like this, he wants to run them over, he wants to compete, and he wants to be the best.”

• Genesis Lythe (Bella Shepard), “an admiral’s daughter determined to make her own name in Starfleet.” Shepard said she was a Dar-Sha, “a brand new species that no one’s ever seen before,” which was particularly exciting for her as a lifelong “Trek” fan.

Other new characters include Tarima Sadal (Zoë Steiner), “a Betazoid and daughter of the president of Betazed” and Commander Lura Thok (recurring guest star Gina Yashere), “a Klingon/Jem’Hadar hybrid who is the chancellor’s First Officer and Cadet Master.” Picardo is recurring his “Star Trek: Voyager” character the Doctor, and Tig Notaro and Oded Fehr are reprising their “Discovery” roles of Jett Reno and Admiral Vance, respectively.  

Starfleet Academy will premiere early in 2026 on the Paramount+ streaming service. No specific start date has been announced at this writing.