Launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome; landing 120 km northwest of Karaganda.

The docking with space station "Salyut 1" was performed, which had been launched 3 days before. While the Soyuz crew was able to achieve "soft dock" with Salyut though the "probe and drogue" docking mechanism, it failed to achieve "hard dock" by securing the docking collar – it was not possible for the crew to enter the station safely.

The mission was aborted, yet the technical problems did not cease and the Soyuz spacecraft had difficulties detaching from the Salyut 1 space station. The separating occured after 5,5 hours and several attempts to enter the spacestation. It was the first night landing in the history of human spaceflights. During the landing Nikolai Rukavishnikov became unconscious due of toxic air in the spacecraft.