It was discovered in October 1851 by William Lassell and named for a character in two different pieces of literature. As of 2019, much of the detailed knowledge of Ariel derives from a single flyby of Uranus performed by the space probe "Voyager 2" in 1986, which managed to image around 35% of the moon's surface. There are no active plans at present to return to study the moon in more detail, although various concepts such as a Uranus orbiter and probe have been proposed.