On December 3, 2020, the first (early) part of Gaia’s third star catalogue will be published. Based on 34 months of Gaia observations it contains a significant increase in the number of entries compared to Gaia DR2: position measurements of more than 1.8 billion stars as well as proper motions, parallaxes, and broad-band photometry for about 1.4 billion stars. Additionally, both the precision and accuracy of the astrometric data has significantly improved, especially the determination of proper motions. Together with the release of the star catalogue, four papers are published, impressively demonstrating the scientific potential of the Gaia EDR3 catalogue.