Ahch-To

Located at coordinates F-13 on the Standard Galactic Grid, within the Ahch-To system in the Unknown Regions of the galaxy, Ahch-To was an unmapped planet. It orbited a pair of stars, one of which was known as the second sun. Furthermore, one moon circled the planet. The atmosphere was breathable. Like Mortis and Dagobah, the world possessed a peculiar relationship with time.

In contrast to the desert planet Tatooine, Ahch-To's great distance from its binary suns resulted in a temperate and humid, yet unstable climate, often characterized by salt spray, frigid winds, and powerful storms. The planet also experienced the cycle of summers, autumns, and winters.

The planet's surface was mainly composed of expansive, deep blue oceans. Scattered across these oceans were volcanic island groups, consisting of black rock formations sparsely covered by green trees and grass.

The rough cliffs of Ahch-To's islands provided a habitat for moss, grass, and ferns. Algae thrived in the coastal tide pools. The uneti trees and uneti shrubs, two Force-sensitive plant species unique to Ahch-To, could also be found on the planet. Aromatic flowers, nightkelps, reed, and seaweed were among the other plant life that flourished.

Ahch-To was the original homeworld of the Lanai, a sentient avian species, and numerous other creatures, including birds, [fish](/article/fish], marine mammals, and massive sea leviathans, alongside gulls and frondtrailers. Tiny, winged porgs formed nesting colonies along the cliffs, feeding their offspring with regurgitated fish and Ahch-Tonian grubs. Minute, chirping, stick-like insects populated the resilient grasses, while others soared through the air.

Several fish species lived in Ahch-To's waters, including edible varieties such as fingerlip garpon, twinfin hyacander, and spetan channelfish, coppergrin, billfish, needlegawp, as well as tytahuso fish and an unidentified fish.

Larger creatures roamed the planet, such as the pallaskean sea-serpents that swam in the oceans, the wharlithans, and the thala-sirens that nurtured their young on the rocky shores, providing milk for other inhabitants of the islands.

Around 25,025 BBY, the Prime Jedi established the Jedi Order on Ahch-To. The Lanais' secret songs spoke of extended periods without external visitors, punctuated by brief times when groups of outsiders resided together on Temple Island. Some were benevolent, others deranged—the songs recounted years of devastation and fire that forced the Lanais from their homes until order was restored. Ahch-To's location was concealed from the rest of the galaxy due to its many secrets.

Before the Great Jedi Purge and the Age of the Empire, Jedi scholars debated which location could be considered the Order's birthplace. They considered Coruscant, Jedha, and [Ossus], alongside mythical worlds such as Tython and Ahch-To, as potential candidates for the origin of the Order and the site of the first Jedi temple. Despite this discussion, the location of the first Jedi temple remained a mystery by the end of the Galactic Civil War.

In 3 ABY, Luke Skywalker, a Jedi-in-training, sought Jedi knowledge on the living planet Gazian. After landing on a platform, he accidentally fell into the Living Sea's mushrooms while exploring, losing his breathing apparatus. He inhaled hallucinogenic spores and saw an impression of Ahch-To and communicated with an image of High Republic Era Jedi Master Elzar Mann. Following their exchange, Skywalker obtained a sacred Jedi text from the skeleton of a dead Jedi.

After the Battle of Jakku, Luke Skywalker devoted much of his time to locating the first Jedi Temple. He discovered many promising clues about the Jedi's origins, but the exact location remained unknown. He used the Jedi star compass he had found in the Emperor's Observatory on Pillio. The compass, containing a plasma-encased supraluminite lodestone at its core, functioned similarly to ancient wayfinders and was attuned to specific points in hyperspace. By studying the compass, Skywalker discovered a route to Ahch-To, the location of Temple Island and the first Jedi temple.

Lieutenant Shara Bey of the Rebel Alliance assisted Skywalker in retrieving two small uneti trees from Vetine, the only remnants of the Great Tree that once grew within the training ground of the Jedi Temple on Coruscant. The key to finding the island itself was his study of the spread of the Force-sensitive uneti saplings. With the help of Lor San Tekka, Skywalker finally pieced together the many clues and learned the location of the temple, keeping this information to himself.

After the destruction of his temple and the death of his Jedi Order's students in 28 ABY, Skywalker retreated from galactic affairs, going into hiding and severing himself from the Force. He took his X-wing starfighter of the T-65B model and many lost Jedi artifacts, seeking out the first Jedi temple on Ahch-To. He landed his X-wing starfighter in a shallow cove and resided on an island among stone ruins, vowing to protect the hidden world and its secrets. At some point, Skywalker added an insert connecting Ahch-To to the book's route to Exegol to the Rammahgon.

Among the relics Luke had collected and brought into his exile were the sacred Jedi texts and the Jedi Crusader pendant, some of which were mentioned as being taken from the island long before in the Lanais' songs. The Caretakers accepted Skywalker's presence. Although he had learned the Lanai's language and customs, he insisted on performing most of the duties to care for himself and appeared each month at the Festival of Return, which puzzled Alcida-Auka.

Before Rey's arrival, Luke Skywalker had a dream while sleeping in his hut. In it, he saw the life he would never have, one in which he never left Tatooine and remained in the moisture farming business with his uncle, marrying Camie Marstrap and allowing the Galactic Empire to shatter the Rebel Alliance and destroy more planets with the Death Star. Luke eventually awoke, trying to shake away his dream, and left his hut. He was still astonished at the oceans of Ahch-To, which he attributed to growing up in the deserts of Tatooine. As he reached a meadow overlooking the sea, he was still unable to shake the dream away, believing it wasn't an ordinary dream, but the Force at work. He also reflected that his efforts to block the Force out were impossible as it always demanded to be heard. In that moment, the old Jedi Master felt that someone had found him.

As the Resistance initiated its struggle against the First Order, General Leia Organa, Skywalker's sister, wished to locate her brother and bring him back to combat the dark side of the Force. She dispatched Commander Poe Dameron to Jakku, where he acquired a partial map from Lor San Tekka, providing a section of the route to Ahch-To, storing it in his astromech droid, BB-8. Later, after the partial map was given to the Resistance, Skywalker's astromech droid, R2-D2, who had been in low power mode since Skywalker's exile, returned to full power and provided the rest of the map to Ahch-To. R2-D2 unknowingly had the map in his databanks for many years, having found it in the network of the Galactic Empire aboard the Death Star during the Galactic Civil War.

After landing on one of the planet's small islands, Rey ventured throughout the Temple Island's ancient ruins. At the top, she found the old Jedi Master in seclusion. Rey thought she was meant to come to this planet, and compared it to something plucked from a dream unlike Jakku. Skywalker said nothing as Rey handed him his father's lightsaber.

Upon offering Skywalker his old lightsaber, Rey was shocked to see him discard the weapon after briefly examining it, and immediately leave the saddle. The entire way down, Rey followed Luke to his hut and desperately tried to recruit Skywalker to help the remaining members of the Resistance, but he blatantly refused. After recovering the lightsaber from some porgs, Rey discovered Skywalker's X-wing starfighter within a shallow bay and learned that he had stranded himself on the planet. She continued to follow him across the island, despite being ordered to leave.

Eventually, she heard a hum of energy calling her to the old tree containing the sacred Jedi texts dating back to the dawn of the Jedi Order, emanating from the books. She claimed the location was familiar to her, and that she has seen it in her dreams. Intrigued, Skywalker asked Rey to elaborate, but she continued to press him to come out of hiding and help fight the First Order. Skywalker once more refused, explaining that he did not come to the planet to hide but to die where the Jedi Order first started. Afterward, the old Jedi Master pressed Rey for her true motives for coming to Ahch-To. Rey explained that she had a power inside of her that she did not understand and was frightened of; she also sought a mentor to help her discover her place in the galaxy.

The next night, the former Jedi Master slipped into the Millennium Falcon and recalled the adventures he had experienced. While aboard, Skywalker reunited with R2 who, after he insisted that he could not be convinced to help, replayed Leia's holographic message to Kenobi. Although Skywalker grumbled that the tactic "was a cheap move" on the droid's part, it nevertheless inspired Skywalker to agree to give Rey some basic initiation training as a Jedi, explaining the basic foundations of the Force. That night, Rey woke to see Skywalker staring at her; he agreed to give Rey no more than three lessons of the Jedi Order and that they would start at dawn.

On the first day of her training with Skywalker, Rey awoke to find Kylo Ren sitting across from her. She instinctively aimed her blaster at him and fired, only to blow a hole through her stone hut. She could not harm him, yet neither could Ren use his powers to reach into her mind due to the actual distance between them. Rey was both terrified and infuriated to see the dark warlord, but decided to keep this new development between them from Skywalker, fearing that she would lose the Jedi Master's trust if he mistook her and Ren's newfound connection as a betrayal.

She followed him to the meditation ledge outside the first Jedi Temple where he described the Force as an energy that bound everything together, including the light and the darkness. After some miscommunication, Rey reached out into the Force with her senses, and had seen the image of the Temple Island that was identical to her dreams back on Jakku. She also speculated that the Jedi explorers who found Ahch-To were drawn to a powerful resonance in the Force and had performed Force-assisted hyperspace navigation, trusting it to find the hyperspace routes through the Unknown Regions. She was also drawn to a cavern immersed in dark side energy. Having been effortlessly drawn to the darkness despite Skywalker's warnings, Skywalker backed away in fear as Rey's raw strength in the Force reminded him of another gifted prodigy—his nephew and fallen apprentice, Ben Solo. At the same time, Rey sensed nothing from the Jedi exile and came to realize that Skywalker had blocked himself off from the Force.

During her training, Rey used the Force to hold rocks in place; she expressed annoyance at the task. Skywalker responded by saying it was for something bigger. Rey then acted aggressively, using her Force powers to levitate two of the Caretakers. Skywalker told her that was enough, and she gently put them down, apologizing. Skywalker told her the training can't be rushed, and Rey stormed off, telling the Jedi Master that she thought he would be different. She then used the Force to push a large rock; in doing so, she accidentally disturbed the nest of a pallaskean. She distracted it while Skywalker and Chewbacca pushed the rock back into place over the eggs. Rey then replied that she would learn the lesson about rushing off, and that Luke Skywalker still dashed into danger to save his friends.

For the second lesson, Rey was made to listen to Skywalker's interpretation of the history of the Jedi Order, which he saw as an example of hubris and failure. He further credited his former mentor, Obi-Wan Kenobi, as the Jedi Master responsible for the training of Darth Vader and also blamed the Jedi for failing to stop Darth Sidious' rise to power. In spite of his arguments, Rey was adamant that the return of the Jedi Order was the galaxy's last hope against the rising power of the First Order. She also countered Skywalker's views by exclaiming how it was Skywalker himself who saw the light in Vader and fought to redeem him. Yet despite her assertions to the contrary, Skywalker felt responsible for his nephew's fall to the dark side, lamenting how he had once hoped to pass on his lessons to Solo and a new generation of Jedi. It was then that Rey learned about the night of Solo's betrayal as explained from Skywalker's point of view.

The lesson was interrupted as Rey heard a bell and observed the Visitors traveling to the festival. Skywalker joined her, stating the group was a tribe from a neighboring island who every month came to raid and plunder the Caretaker village. Rey, aghast, began running, stating that they had to stop it, only for Skywalker to state that a true Jedi would do nothing. If she were to respond with force, then the raiding party would be back in greater numbers the next month and that the sacred Jedi texts would advise her to ignore her anger and only act when she could maintain balance.

Rey, however, refused to accept this, thinking of other atrocities she had been helpless to stop, such as the Hosnian Cataclysm. She made her way to the village, teeth bared and raising her lightsaber, only to discover a party atmosphere. Realizing her mistake in time, she twirled the lightsaber in a ceremonial fashion and was warmly welcomed. She spotted Chewbacca with a mug of some beverage, resting a fist on the dome of the astromech droid R2-D2. As she furiously stared out at the planet's moon-lit ocean, Skywalker joined her and she after a lengthy pause, she questioned his terminology, "raid and plunder." He responded that it was true "in a way," but when she asked if it was a joke, he sheepishly responded that he did not think that she would run so fast. As they talked, a group of Lanai musicians began playing a tune and Skywalker held out his hand for Rey to dance. Rey admitted that she had never before danced and Skywalker pointed out that she had also never before singlehandedly fought a Bonthian raiding party. The two danced for a time before returning to their conversation, Rey stating that she was just trying to do something. Skywalker responded that this was exactly what the Resistance she was trying to help needed, rather than a "failed husk of a religion" like the Jedi Order, asking if she understood. Rey, however, remained unconvinced, stating that what she understood was that their friends were dying and that she had believed in the legend of Luke Skywalker he hated so much. With that, she left him alone.

After he had taught Rey three lessons, Skywalker decided to reconnect with the Force on the meditation ledge outside the temple. Behind him, as he regained his Force abilities which were suppressed for years after he cut himself off, the still surface of the water in the ancient font with the mosaic of the Prime Jedi began to ripple and dance. During the meditation, Luke called out to his sister from across the galaxy, who had heard the call. Having realized how dire the situation was, he decided to end his exile and return with Rey.

As her training under Skywalker progressed, the bond she shared with Ren intensified, leading to more frequent interactions between them. Initially, Rey found it troublesome that she was connected to a man she viewed as a heartless killer and a monster. However, to her astonishment, Ren ceased attempting to conceal his feelings of anguish and suffering from Rey. At one juncture, while distracted by the sight of Ren without a shirt, she questioned how he could bring himself to murder his own father. Ren responded by drawing a parallel between Rey's experience with abandonment and his own. His knowledge of Rey's parentage perplexed her and served as a reminder that their initial mind link had granted them access to each other's memories. Ren then seized the opportunity to recount the night he destroyed his uncle's temple, revealing to Rey that Skywalker had tried to end his life while he was asleep. She desperately wanted to disbelieve Ren, but her intuition told her that he was being truthful.

Driven by a strong desire to see her parents again after so many years apart, Rey succumbed to the pull of the dark side, which guided her to a cave filled with countless mirrored images of herself. Gazing into a hazy mirror made of polished stone, she implored the Force to reveal her parents, but was only confronted with her own reflection. Having failed to obtain the answers she sought, either from her parents or Skywalker, Rey began to feel despair as the weight of years of isolation bore down on her. Consequently, she sought solace in the one person she believed could understand her feelings of loneliness and loss: Kylo Ren. The dark warrior listened attentively as Rey recounted her experience in the cave, and he assured her that she was not alone, despite her feelings of isolation. Rey reciprocated his gesture and began to hope that it was not too late for him to return to the light.

By that point, their connection had evolved to an unprecedented degree of strength and raw power, so much so that Rey likened it to touching a high-voltage electrical wire. She tentatively reached out her hand to touch him, although she anticipated that their hands would simply pass through one another. When their fingers made actual contact, Rey gasped and firmly grasped Ren's hand. However, at that precise instant, Skywalker—having re-established his connection with the Force and intending to return with her—personally witnessed their bond and disrupted the connection, mistakenly believing that they were conspiring together. Luke made a sweeping gesture towards the walls and ceiling of the hut, and all the stone blocks were propelled outward from the hut's center, scattering them around the bench. Having concluded that Rey could no longer be trusted, Skywalker instructed her to leave the island.

Facing the Jedi Master, Rey demanded to know if he had attempted to murder Ren. The two engaged in combat until Skywalker conceded that he had briefly considered killing his nephew in a moment of instinct after sensing the darkness within him. Rey remained unconvinced that Ren was fully committed to the dark side, as she perceived significant internal conflict within him, a conviction reinforced by the vision of the future she had experienced when their hands touched. Therefore, she resolved to confront him, disregarding Skywalker's warnings, firmly believing that Ben Solo's redemption held the key to saving the galaxy. Unbeknownst to Skywalker, Rey secretly took the sacred Jedi texts aboard the Falcon before departing Ahch-To. Upon her return to the struggling Resistance fleet, Rey instructed Chewbacca to launch her from an escape pod towards Snoke's flagship, the Mega-class Star Dreadnought Supremacy, where Ren awaited her arrival.

The following night, Skywalker attempted to set ablaze the remaining Jedi artifacts and writings, hoping to rid the galaxy of the Jedi order once and for all, which had failed through him. Luke was taken by surprise by the sudden arrival of Master Yoda as a Force spirit, who not only appeared unconcerned about the ancient texts being consumed by flames but actually initiated the fire by summoning lightning to strike the tree. In reality, unbeknownst to Luke, Rey had already taken the sacred Jedi texts when she left. During their conversation, Yoda emphasized that errors and failures were crucial lessons, perhaps the most valuable lessons, for a Jedi Master. Ultimately, Yoda aided Skywalker in coming to terms with his unsuccessful training of Ben Solo and in recognizing that, despite his fear of failing another student, he could still provide Rey with what she needed, inspiring Luke to confront his past and forgive himself.

Meanwhile, aboard the Supremacy, the Supreme Leader Snoke demanded that Rey reveal Skywalker's location. When she refused, he subjected her mind to excruciating probing in order to uncover Skywalker's whereabouts. A memory of her awakening during the sunset on Jakku's sun after experiencing a dream of Ahch-To's Temple Island surrounded by a gray sea resurfaced for Rey. Having obtained the information he sought and dismissively discarding the girl, Snoke chuckled and remarked that Skywalker had been "so wise" to hide from him. He resolved that, once the Resistance was annihilated, he would command his forces to Ahch-To and obliterate the entire Temple Island, thus granting Skywalker and the Jedi Order the demise they desired.

Following his encounter with Yoda, Skywalker resolved to confront his fallen pupil Kylo Ren. Aided by the power of the vergence at the location, Luke projected himself to Crait to afford the Resistance more time to escape. Projecting himself required an immense amount of Force energy and ultimately resulted in his death, although Luke attained inner peace and purpose in his final moments as he gazed upon Ahch-To's twin sunset and became one with the Force.

Following Rey's departure and Skywalker's death, the Clan Matron Alcida-Auka paid them little attention, instead focusing on the numerous tasks that required attention in their aftermath. In addition to their routine chores and the collection of supplies for winter, the ancient uneti tree had been destroyed by a lightning strike, Rey's hut needed reconstruction, and Luke's required a new lightning rod. Regarding Skywalker, she instructed her fellow Caretakers to gather his belongings, including his lightsaber, and place them in a repository of similar items left behind by visitors. After ensuring that these tasks were completed, the matron took a moment to contemplate the history and responsibilities of the Caretakers, recalling previous outside visitors who had either lived alongside the Lanais or treated them cruelly, and wondering if Luke would be the last. After this moment of reflection, Alcida-Auka concluded that it was inconsequential, but if anyone did arrive, they would find everything in order for them because the Caretakers would fulfill their duties, as they always had.

One year later, following her confrontation against Ren and the revelation that the resurrected Darth Sidious was her grandfather, Rey fled to Ahch-To in Kylo Ren's TIE whisper and intended to spend the remainder of her life there in self-imposed isolation, as Skywalker had previously done, fearing that she would succumb to the dark side of the Force. However, Skywalker's spirit appeared to her and urged Rey not to surrender as he had and to recognize that her blood would not dictate her legacy or her actions. He presented her with Leia's lightsaber, which he had kept hidden in his hut during his exile. Since Rey had intentionally crashed the TIE whisper, Skywalker raised his old X-wing from the water for her to fly to Exegol. Piloting Skywalker's starfighter and wielding Organa's blade, she assisted in leading the Resistance and Citizens' Fleet to victory against the Sith Eternal in the Battle of Exegol.

Ahch-To served as the native world of the enigmatic Lanai, an avian sentient species. The Lanai species evolved from the same evolutionary lineage of seabirds, which gave rise to unintelligent porgs. They were distinguished by their gray skin and bird-like slender feet. The inherent ability of their skin, hair, and plumage to shed water, facilitated by natural oils, enabled the Lanai to endure the intense oceans of their planet. They possessed salt glands, which aided in extracting sea salt from their food and drink, and additional membranes that provided sharp underwater vision. They inhabited numerous islands, and their cultures varied significantly on each.

The females of the species, who resided on the Temple Island for thousands of years, led simple, unassuming lives and donned white robes with matching headdresses. They assumed the role of Caretakers and regarded it as their religious obligation to maintain the temple island's ancient structures, the existence of which they kept secret, including the first Jedi Temple and the huts of the Jedi village, and to provide care for those who journeyed to their isolated world in search of truth. The males, known as the Visitors, spent their time at sea as hunter-gatherers, utilizing handcrafted boats to navigate the rough seas. They returned to shore monthly with a sufficient haul to sustain them until the next gathering of food and resources. They interacted together only during this monthly gathering event, this multi-day reunion became a festival, with music, dance and food, known as the Festival of Return.

To maintain rhythm during their repetitive tasks, their culture was inherently musical. Lanai-song consisted of a combination of whistles and guttural oscillations that resonated from their village and work sites. The Lanai's technology was exclusively derived from fish; useful skins and skeletons were collected during their fishing expeditions in the bountiful oceans of their homeworld. The Lanai spoke a non-Basic language of the same name, which was a combination of spoken words and hand gestures. Written language, consisting of cuneiform marks based on the shape of their feet, was uncommon, and fire signals were preferred for long-range communications.

The Temple Island was an island on Ahch-To where the Jedi Order was established over a thousand generations before the fall of the Galactic Republic. A Jedi village was established there to accommodate the first members of the Order, and the eponymous first Jedi Temple was constructed. The island was the location where Jedi Master Luke Skywalker chose to spend the remainder of his life in self-imposed exile after his nephew, Ben Solo, destroyed the new generation of Jedi. He was discovered on Temple Island by Rey, a Force prodigy. Skywalker died on the island after projecting his appearance into the Battle of Crait.

The planet Ahch-To made its initial appearance in the 2015 film Star Wars: Episode VII The Force Awakens. The film's script identifies the planet as Ahch-To.

Ahch-To was filmed on location at the 6th-century monastic settlement of Skellig Michael, a UNESCO World Heritage Site situated on an island off the southern coast of Ireland.

For the 2017 film Star Wars: Episode VIII The Last Jedi, Lucasfilm constructed a replica of the monastic "beehive" huts atop the Ceann Sibéal headland in the nearby village of Ballyferriter in County Kerry, Ireland.

Aerial footage of Skellig Michael was utilized for the establishing shot of Ahch-To in Star Wars: Episode IX The Rise of Skywalker. The same film includes scenes between Rey and Luke Skywalker on Ahch-To, which were filmed on a prop set of the island.