Starship is a two-stage, fully reusable, super heavy-lift launch vehicle under development by American aerospace company SpaceX. Currently built and launched from Starbase in Texas, it is intended as the successor to the company's Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, and is part of SpaceX's broader reusable launch system development program. If completed as designed, Starship would be the first fully reusable orbital rocket and have the highest payload capacity of any launch vehicle to date. As of September 28, 2026, Starship has launched times, with successful flights and failures.
The vehicle consists of two stages: the Super Heavy booster and the Starship spacecraft, both powered by Raptor engines burning liquid methane (the main component of natural gas) and liquid oxygen. Both stages are intended to return to the launch site and land vertically at the launch tower for potential reuse. Once in space, the Starship upper stage is intended to function as a standalone spacecraft capable of carrying crew and cargo. Missions beyond low Earth orbit would require multiple in-orbit refueling flights. At the end of its mission, Starship reenters the atmosphere using heat shield tiles similar to those of the Space Shuttle. SpaceX states that its goal is to reduce launch costs by reusing and mass-producing both stages.
SpaceX initially expressed ambitions to use Starship for crewed missions to Mars, but the plan was revised to prioritize returning humans to the Moon. SpaceX has also proposed a wide range of missions for Starship, such as deploying large satellites, space station modules, and space telescopes. A crewed variant, the Starship Human Landing System, is being developed under a contract with NASA as part of the Artemis program, with a docking test as part of Artemis III, currently scheduled for 2027, and a crewed lunar landing scheduled for 2028.
SpaceX began developing concepts for a super heavy-lift reusable launch vehicle as early as 2005. Starship's current design and name were introduced in 2018. Development has followed an iterative and incremental approach, involving a high number of prototype vehicles and test flights. The first full Starship rocket was launched April 20, 2023, exploding four minutes after liftoff. The program has failed to meet many of its optimistic schedule goals, with several setbacks in development, including the failure of the first four Block 2 upper stages in 2025. However, in September 2026, Starship flight 14 achieved orbit of the Starship spacecraft in a significant milestone, despite an engine failure.
Description When stacked and fully fueled, Starship has a mass of approximately , a diameter of and a height of . The rocket has been designed with the goal of being fully reusable to reduce launch costs; it consists of the Super Heavy booster and the Starship upper stage which are powered by Raptor (RSL) and Raptor Vacuum (RVac) engines.
The bodies of both rocket stages are made from stainless steel and are manufactured by stacking and welding stainless steel cylinders. These cylinders have a height of , and a thickness of .
A common dome inside the spacecraft separate the methane and oxygen tanks. SpaceX has stated that Starship, in its "baseline reusable design", will have a payload capacity of to low Earth orbit and to geostationary transfer orbit.
Super Heavy booster
Starship spacecraft
Raptor engine
Raptor is a family of rocket engines developed by SpaceX for use in Starship and Super Heavy vehicles. It burns liquid oxygen and methane in an efficient and complex full-flow staged combustion power cycle. The Raptor engine uses methane as fuel rather than kerosene because methane gives higher performance and prevents the build-up of deposits in the engine from coking. Methane can also be produced from carbon dioxide and hydrogen using the Sabatier reaction. The engines are designed to be reused many times with little maintenance.
Raptor operates with an oxygen-to-methane mixture ratio of about , lower than the stoichiometric mixture ratio of necessary for complete combustion, since operating at higher temperatures would melt the engine. The propellants leave the pre-burners and get injected into the main combustion chamber as hot gases instead of liquid droplets, enabling a higher power density as the propellants mix rapidly via diffusion. The methane and oxygen are at high enough temperatures and pressures that they ignite on contact, eliminating the need for igniters in the main combustion chamber. The engine structure itself is mostly aluminum, copper, and steel; oxidizer-side turbopumps and manifolds subject to corrosive oxygen-rich flames are made of an Inconel-like SX500 superalloy. Some components are 3D printed.
A Raptor 2 engine produces at a specific impulse of at sea level and in a vacuum. Raptor vacuum, used on the Starship upper stage, is modified with a regeneratively cooled nozzle extension made of brazed steel tubes, increasing its expansion ratio to about 90 and its specific impulse in vacuum to . The main combustion chamber operates at a pressure of exceeding that of any prior operational rocket engine. The Raptor's gimbaling range is 15°, higher than the RS-25's 12.5° and the Merlin's 5°. SpaceX has stated they aim to achieve a per unit production cost of US$250,000 upon starting mass production.
Versions
+ Performance metrics Block 1 2 34 Payload to orbit (t) 15 35 100 200 Booster propellant (t) 3,250 3,6504,050 Ship propellant (t) 1,200 1,500 1,600 2,300 Booster liftoff thrust (tf) 7,500 8,240 10,000 Ship initial thrust (tf) 1,250 1,400 1,600 2,700 Ship sea-level engines 3 Ship vacuum engines 3 6 Booster height (m) 71 72.3 81 Ship height (m) 50.3 52.1 61 Total height (m) 121.3 123.3 124.4 142
On April 4, 2024, Elon Musk provided an update on Starship at Starbase, where two new versions of Starship were announced, Block 2 and Block 3, intended to address the shortcomings of the pre-production prototypes.
Block 1 Block 1 was used after 2020–2021 flight tests, beginning with flight test 1 at the start of 2023, to flight tests 5 and 6, then retired.
Block 2 Block 2 for both stages was used beginning with flight test 7 at the start of 2025. Block 2 upper stage vehicles featured a thinner forward flap design, flaps that are positioned more leeward, a 25% increase in propellant capacity, redesigned avionics, two raceways, and an increase in thrust. The integrated vehicle is taller than the previous Block 1 vehicle and was planned to have a payload capacity of at least 100 tons to orbit when reused (similar to the original design before the Block 2 rework) but was retired before an orbital flight, with the final estimate of 35 t of payload to orbit. Additionally, Block 2 vehicles were planned to use Raptor 3 engines, removing the need for secondary engine shielding. However, the first Block 2 vehicle, S33, received upgraded Raptor 2 engines, with an unknown increase in thrust. The Block 2 ship and booster first flew on flight test 7. A total of six block 2 vehicles were produced. After flight test 11, Block 2 was retired.
Block 3 Block 3 ships have an improved tile design, Raptor 3 engines, as well as hardware for refueling operations in LEO, such as docking ports and a redesigned quick disconnect. The switch to Raptor 3 also enables the removal of most of the aft section's shielding.
Block 3 boosters have an integrated vented interstage/forward dome, three grid fins instead of the prior four, and use the grid fins as tower catch points, eliminating the need for separate catch point structure. Like with the ship, the Block 3 boosters use Raptor 3 engines, allowing for the removal of the majority of the booster's engine shielding, reducing weight by over a ton per engine. First test flights of Block 3 ships began in 2026.
Planned launch and landing profile
Payloads will be integrated into Starship at a separate facility and then rolled out to the launch site. Super Heavy and Starship are then to be stacked onto their launch mount and loaded with fuel via the ship quick disconnect (SQD) arm and booster quick disconnect (BQD). The SQD and BQD retract, all 33 engines of Super Heavy ignite, and the rocket lifts off.
At approximately 141 seconds after launch at an altitude of roughly , Super Heavy cuts off 28 of its 33 engines, leaving 5 engines running at reduced throttle. Starship then ignites its engines while still attached to the booster, and separates. The booster then rotates to an aft-first attitude, before relighting the 28 other engines for a "boostback burn" which stops all forward velocity, then switching to 13 engines and finally 3 to precisely target the landing area. After the boostback burn, the booster's engines shut off with Super Heavy on a trajectory for a controlled descent to the launch site using its three grid fins for minor course corrections. Roughly six minutes after launch, shortly before landing, it ignites its inner 13 engines, then shuts off all but the same 5 used for hot-staging, to perform a landing burn which slows it sufficiently to be finally caught by a pair of electric actuating arms attached to the launch tower. The booster landing and catch was successfully demonstrated for the first time on October 13, 2024, with the landing of Booster 12, and twice more with Boosters 14 and 15.
Meanwhile, the Starship spacecraft continues accelerating to orbital velocity with its six Raptor engines. Once in orbit, the spacecraft is planned to be able to be refueled by another Starship tanker variant. Musk has estimated that 8 launches would be needed to refuel a Starship in low Earth orbit completely. NASA has estimated that 16 launches in short succession (due to cryogenic propellant boil-off) would be needed to refuel Starship for one lunar landing partially. To land on bodies without an atmosphere, such as the Moon, Starship will fire its engines to slow down. To land on bodies with an atmosphere, such as the Earth and Mars, Starship first slows by entering the atmosphere using a heat shield. The spacecraft would then perform a "belly-flop" maneuver by diving through the atmosphere at a 60° angle to the ground, controlling its fall using four flaps at the front and aft of the spacecraft. Shortly before landing, the Raptor engines fire, using fuel from the header tanks, to perform a "landing flip" maneuver to return to a vertical orientation, with the Raptor engines' gimbaling helping to maneuver the craft. Omitting the thermal protection system, flaps, and tower-catch hardware for a guided atmospheric deceleration and "Mechazilla" tower catch allows for significant weight savings on the HLS and depot.
If Starship's second stage lands on a pad, a mobile hydraulic lift will move it to a transporter vehicle. If it lands on a floating platform, it will be transported by a barge to a port and then transported by road. The recovered Starship will either be positioned on the launch mount for another launch or refurbished at a SpaceX facility.
Development Early design concepts (2012–2019)
In November 2005, before SpaceX had launched its first rocket the Falcon 1, CEO Elon Musk first mentioned a high-capacity rocket concept able to launch to low Earth orbit, dubbed the BFR. Later in 2012, Elon Musk first publicly announced plans to develop a rocket surpassing the capabilities of Space X's existing Falcon 9. SpaceX called it the Mars Colonial Transporter, as the rocket was to transport humans to Mars and back. In 2016, the descriptor was changed to Interplanetary Transport System, as the rocket was planned to travel beyond Mars as well. The conceptual design called for a carbon fiber structure, a mass in excess of when fully fueled, a payload of to low Earth orbit while being fully reusable. By 2017, the concept was again re-dubbed the BFR.