This mission was the seventh Soviet attempt to recover soil samples from the surface of the Moon and the first after the success of Luna 16.

Contact with the spacecraft was lost at 07:48 UT at the previously determined point of lunar landing.

Impact coordinates were 3°34' north latitude and 56°30' east longitude, near the edge of the Mare Fecunditatis ("Sea of Fertility").

Officially, the Soviets announced that "the lunar landing in the complex mountainous conditions proved to be unfavorable."

Later, in 1975, the Soviets published data from Luna 18's continuous-wave radio altimeter that determined the mean density of the lunar topsoil.