The Mars rover went silent after a massive dust storm engulfed the red planet in June and, blocking out the sunshine, cut off the energy from Opportunity.
However, NASA has confirmed they have found the rover, sharing a photo of the machine.
Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter took a picture of Opportunity, 166 miles (267km) up the surface of the red planet.
The photo, taken last week but released only on Tuesday by NASA‘s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, shows a pale dot, which the US space agency believe is the Opportunity.
The skies have since cleared, but the solar panels fuelling Opportunity seemed not to have regained enough power to make contact once again to flight controllers.
Despite NASA has relentlessly worked to contact its rover, the space agency is now opening up to the idea the 15-year-old rover may not have survived the prolonged power outage.
However, they are not yet ready to give up.
Conceding their morale is “shaky”, engineers at NASA have come up with a themed playlist that could inspire the rover to wake up – or at least keep NASA workers’ spirits high.
The list includes 18 songs, from Wham!’s ‘Wake Me up Before You Go-Go’ and The Beatles’ ‘Here Comes the Sun’ to Queen’s ‘Keep Yourself Alive.’
Opportunity was launched in 2003 as part of NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover program to find signs of life on the Red Planet.
But the days of Opportunity are literally counted.
At the end of August, NASA said they only had a window of 45 days to contact Opportunity.
If by mid-October the rover is still silent, NASA will give up on it, as Opportunity will “more than likely not never recover”.
John Callas, Opportunity project manager at JPL, said at the end of August: “The Sun is breaking through the haze over Perseverance Valley, and soon there will be enough sunlight present that Opportunity should be able to recharge its batteries.
“When the tau level [a measure of the amount of particulate matter in the Martian sky] dips below 1.5, we will begin a period of actively attempting to communicate with the rover by sending it commands via the antennas of NASA’s Deep Space Network.
“Assuming that we hear back from Opportunity, we will begin the process of discerning its status and bringing it back online.”