There was applause in mission control as the SMART-1 orbiter smashed into a lunar hillside at 7,200 kilometers per hour, hitting its target after a hurried, last-minute course correction.
It’s the end of a three-year mission by the European Space Agency (ESA) that used the mission to test new technologies such as an efficient ion propulsion system.
The ESA hopes the technology will take it to Mercury and other planets.
Shortly before the planned crash ESA ground controllers had to hastily steer the craft around a looming, 1.6 km-high crater rim by firing its thrusters as the probe orbited lower and lower.
The revolutionary probe smashed into a plain called the Lake of Excellence on the southwestern side of the Moon's face.
The two-kilometres-per-second impact threw up a massive cloud of dust that was watched live via a French-Canadian telescope based in Hawaii.
From ESA's base in Darmstadt, Germany, the mission's chief scientist Bernard Foing said it produced a more intense flash than expected.
The agency's spokesman Bernard Von Weyhe described the probe's demise as "pretty spectacular" and said that significant amounts of material had spewed out on impact, allowing scientists to carry out further tests on the crash site.
Propulsion system
During its months in orbit around the moon, the spacecraft scanned the lunar surface from orbit and took high-resolution pictures.
But its primary mission was testing a new, efficient, ion propulsion system officials hope to use on the BepiColombo mission to Mercury slated for 2013.
SMART-1 - Small Mission for Advanced Research and Technology - was launched into Earth orbit by an Ariane-5 booster rocket from Kourou, French Guiana, in September 2003.
The probe is a cube measuring roughly a metre on each side and the entire mission cost the ESA €110 million (A$185 million), which is seen as relatively cheap.
SMART-1's X-ray and infrared spectrometres have also gathered information about the moon's geology that scientists hope will advance their knowledge about how the moon's surface evolved and test theories about how the moon came into being.
While parts of the surface have been explored by astronauts, the spacecraft surveyed the entire surface for a more comprehensive set of data.
Scientists have said that the 20,000 extremely detailed photos transmitted by the craft will yield a fresh look at the Moon, revealing Earth's satellite as a place of surprising complexity and promise rather than a lifeless rock with little to offer except grey dust.