Zond 8 was launched on 20 October 1970, at 19:55:39 GMT by a Proton-K / Blok D launcher from Site 81/23 of the Baikonur Cosmodrome, towards the Moon.

[1] The announced objectives of Zond 8 were investigations of the Moon and circumlunar space and testing of onboard systems and units.

Zond 8 reached the Moon without any apparent problems, circling its target on 24 October at a range of 1,110 kilometres (690 mi) and took both black-and-white and color photographs of the lunar surface during two separate sessions.

The guidance system, however, malfunctioned on the return leg, and the spacecraft performed a simple ballistic (instead of a guided) reentry into Earth's atmosphere.

Zond 9 was planned to launch in July 1969, carrying a crew of Pavel Popovich and Vitali Sevastyanov, but never flew.