Starship

📷 Steve Jurvetson / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

Starship is SpaceX’s fully reusable super heavy-lift rocket — the largest and most powerful flying machine ever built. The two-stage stack of the Super Heavy booster and the Starship upper stage stands about 121 m tall and 9 m wide, and lifts off on roughly 74,000 kN of thrust from 33 methane-burning Raptor engines, about double a Saturn V. It is designed to carry 100,000 kg or more to low Earth orbit with both stages flying home to be used again.

As of late 2025 Starship remained in flight testing, with no operational payloads beyond test deployments. Its test campaign had nonetheless produced feats no other rocket has matched — including catching a returning 70 m booster out of the air with the launch tower’s mechanical arms.

Development History

SpaceX has pursued a giant Mars rocket under changing names since the mid-2010s. The stainless-steel Starship design took shape from 2019 at Starbase in South Texas, where prototypes flew increasingly ambitious hops — several ending in fireballs — until the SN15 prototype landed cleanly from 10 km altitude in May 2021.

The first full stack launched on 20 April 2023 and was destroyed after multiple engine failures, but each flight after it went further. Through 2024 the program hit its stride: Flight 4 in June brought both stages down to controlled ocean splashdowns, and Flight 5 in October achieved the first tower catch of the Super Heavy booster.

2025 was a grind. Several upper-stage failures in the first half of the year slowed progress, though Flight 9 in May reflew a previously caught booster for the first time. Flight 10 in August 2025 then completed a full mission rehearsal, deploying Starlink simulator payloads and relighting a Raptor engine in space. NASA is counting on a Starship variant as the crewed lunar lander for Artemis III.

Design & Capabilities

Both stages are stainless steel, chosen over carbon fiber for its low cost, strength at cryogenic temperatures and tolerance of reentry heat. The Super Heavy booster packs 33 Raptors — full-flow staged-combustion engines, the first of their kind to fly — burning liquid methane and liquid oxygen. It returns to the launch site and is caught by the tower, eliminating landing legs entirely so it can be re-stacked quickly.

The upper stage, itself called Starship, carries six Raptors and reenters belly-first behind thousands of ceramic heat-shield tiles before flipping upright to land. SpaceX targets 100,000 to 150,000 kg to low Earth orbit in fully reusable mode — figures still to be demonstrated — plus around 1,000 cubic meters of payload volume, comparable to the pressurized volume of the International Space Station. Orbital refueling, a key technology for lunar and Mars missions, is next on the test list.

Notable Missions

The April 2023 debut became the most powerful rocket launch in history the moment it cleared the pad, surpassing the Soviet N1. It also shattered the pad itself, hurling concrete chunks hundreds of meters and prompting SpaceX to build a water-cooled steel flame deflector for every flight since.

Flight 5 on 13 October 2024 delivered the program’s signature image: the returning booster easing into the tower’s waiting arms. Flight 9 in May 2025 proved a caught booster could fly again, and Flight 10 in August 2025 rehearsed a complete satellite-deployment mission. What comes next — orbital refueling demonstrations and the Artemis lunar lander — will decide how quickly Starship turns from test vehicle into workhorse.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is Starship the most powerful rocket ever?

Yes, by a wide margin. Its roughly 74,000 kN of liftoff thrust is about double the Saturn V’s 34,500 kN and well beyond the Soviet N1, which never flew successfully. At about 121 m tall and roughly 5,000,000 kg fully fueled, it is also the tallest and heaviest rocket ever launched.

How much can Starship actually carry?

SpaceX targets 100,000 to 150,000 kg to low Earth orbit with both stages reused, but as of late 2025 no version had flown an operational payload, only Starlink simulators. The real number will emerge as designs iterate; even the low end would roughly double any rocket flying today.

Why is Starship made of stainless steel?

Steel is cheap — a small fraction of carbon fiber’s price per kilogram — gets stronger at the cryogenic temperatures of its propellants, and tolerates far more heat during reentry, reducing the shielding needed. It is also easy to weld outdoors, which lets SpaceX build ships rapidly in tents and high bays at Starbase.

How does the booster catch work?

Instead of landing legs, the returning Super Heavy relights engines to hover beside the launch tower, which grabs it with two huge steel arms nicknamed chopsticks, catching hardpoints near the grid fins. Skipping legs saves tonnes of weight, and setting the booster straight back on the pad enables faster reflights. It first worked in October 2024.