What we covered here
• The 12th test flight of SpaceX’s Starship megarocket came to a dramatic close, with the spacecraft managing to complete a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean despite operating without one of its engines.
• The spacecraft — a new prototype called Starship V3 — released mock satellites during a brief suborbital journey.
• The test flight was the Starship program’s first since October. The company experienced several mishaps with its V2 prototype and scrubbed its first V3 launch attempt Thursday evening after issues arose with seconds left on the countdown clock.
• SpaceX is racing to get Starship ready to launch satellites and carry humans into deep space. The company hopes to fulfill NASA’s plan to use the vehicle to land its astronauts on the moon by 2028.
• The company is also facing increasing scrutiny from investors as it gears up for a record-shattering IPO.
We’ve wrapped our coverage of SpaceX’s debut launch of the V3 Starship megarocket. You can relive the test flight’s highlights here.
Launch was a mix of wins and losses
The first launch of Starship’s scaled-up V3 was a dramatic balancing act of wins and losses.
The mission brought a roller coaster of highs and lows after taking off from SpaceX’s Starbase launch facilities at Texas’ southernmost tip. After liftoff, the vehicle soared over the Gulf and the upper Starship spacecraft, or “ship,” splashed down in the Indian Ocean roughly an hour later despite an engine issue that repeatedly threated to destroy the vehicle.
No issues cropped up during the countdown, unlike Thursday’s launch attempt, and Starship lifted off directly at the top of the window, all 33 of its Raptor engines roaring to life. After reaching an orbital trajectory that was “within bounds,” Starship was able to deploy a batch of 22 mock satellites, two of which were equipped with cameras to eye Starship’s heat shield – capturing stunning footage in the process.
But the Super Heavy booster didn’t complete a full “boost back” burn, which allows the booster to make a controlled landing, or in this case, a controlled splashdown. And only five of the Starship spacecraft’s six engines ignited, which prevented it from getting on the right orbital path, although the trajectory remained “within bounds” to stay on a suborbital flight. The issue prevented the team from attempting a relight of the engines in space ahead of splashdown.
Despite the issues, and only having two of its three engines lit for for a landing burn, re-entry and splashdown were smooth, and Starship made a controlled landing in the Indian Ocean before a fiery finish to the cheers of SpaceX employees.
Starship could have a $90 million sticker price
If successful, Starship promises to dramatically reshape the global space industry by lowering the price-per-pound of hauling cargo to orbit by orders of magnitude.
SpaceX advertises Starship as being capable of hauling between 150 and 250 metric tons of cargo to orbit. And a recent financial disclosure from a SpaceX customer, Voyager Technologies, revealed the company had a $90 million deal with SpaceX for a future launch.
For context, SpaceX’s Falcon 9, which is currently the most active commercial rocket in the world, launches up to about 22.8 metric tons with a sticker price of $60 to $75 million.
SpaceX and Blue Origin are locked in a race of their own
While the US government is racing against China to stake out a base on the moon, SpaceX and its chief competitor, Blue Origin, are duking it out for their place in the grand scheme of NASA’s lunar ambitions.
In a somewhat direct public admonishment of SpaceX, Sean Duffy, who briefly served as NASA’s acting administrator last year, announced that the space agency would use whichever lander was ready first to complete the landing mission, which is currently slated for as soon as 2028. Previously, NASA had planned specifically for Starship to complete that task.
Blue Origin plans to debut a preliminary design of its lunar lander — which is more similar in design to the Apollo-era vehicles that relayed astronauts from their spacecraft down to the moon’s surface — later this year.
It’s not yet clear which vehicle might be ready for a moon landing first, but regardless, few experts believe the mission can actually happen by 2028.
However, since’s Duffy’s 2025 declarations, both Blue Origin and SpaceX have announced operational changes aimed at demonstrating their commitment to NASA’s moon plans.
Blue Origin said it was pausing flights of its suborbital New Shepard vehicle, which has been carrying wealthy thrill-seekers and celebrities such as Katy Perry and William Shatner on 10-minute trips to the edge of space. The move would allow Blue Origin to “shift resources to further accelerate development of the company’s human lunar capabilities,” the company said at the time.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk made his own announcement on X, saying in a Superbowl Sunday post that SpaceX has shifted its priorities from his long-held ambition of Mars to building “a self-growing city on the Moon.”
It was a dramatic departure from over two decades of Mars-centric rhetoric from Musk.
Yes, SpaceX still wants Starship to fly people between Earthly cities
SpaceX hopes Starship will not only serve as an interplanetary transportation system, shuttling people around the solar system — but also as a hypersonic airplane of sorts, moving people between any two cities on Earth in less than an hour.
CEO Elon Musk and SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell used to advertise this goal quite a bit more than they have in recent years. Shotwell in 2018, for example, hailed “point-to-point” rocket transportation as one concept she was most excited for and said it would happen within a decade.
And while Musk hasn’t mentioned it as often in recent showman-style speeches about Starship, it has maintained a quiet presence on the company’s website, advertising a theoretical 34-minute flight between London and Hong Kong.
And SpaceX made clear in IPO documents filed Wednesday that this Earth-based transportation goal is still very much part of the plan, though the company acknowledged there are hurdles ahead — technologically, economically and politically.
Those challenges include “restrictions on supersonic flights over land in certain regions due to sonic booms, and the economic feasibility of shorter routes,” SpaceX noted in the filing.
But, SpaceX says, “we believe we are strategically positioned to take share of the terrestrial logistics and transportation market.”
Will SpaceX or Blue Origin land on the moon first?
CNN asked two space investment insiders — Phil Scully, general partner with Balerion Space Ventures, and Andrew Chanin, CEO of the investment firm ProcureAM — for their take on the race between SpaceX and Blue Origin to get NASA a vehicle capable of ferrying astronauts from lunar orbit down to the moon.
SpaceX is putting up Starship for the task while Blue Origin is developing a more straightforward vehicle, called Blue Moon, which is far more similar to Apollo-style landers, such as the famed Eagle.
Here’s what Scully and Chanin — in separate email interviews that have been lightly edited for clarity — had to say:
Do you think Blue Moon or Starship will conduct the first moon landing?
Chanin: We are not allowed to make projections or predictions. It wouldn’t be surprising to see Starship in the lead. But anything’s possible.
Scully: Starship V3 still needs to reach orbit, deploy payloads, and demonstrate reusability for both stages, along with in-space refueling. Essentially, the question of which conducts the first lunar landing likely comes down to a balance of execution timing and ambition. However, Blue Origin currently has a strong edge
Do you think SpaceX missing out on a “first” to Blue Origin would affect investor perceptions?
Chanin: I think it would be less problematic for SpaceX if they weren’t first, but any downside to SpaceX would likely be less than the benefit to Blue Origin.
Scully: While a Blue Origin “first” could create a short-term narrative shift, it’s unlikely to materially change the long-term perception of SpaceX, which is driven more by its existing scale, diversified business base, and how Starship could define the future of space operations.
Starship development cost SpaceX $3B last year
In a recent financial disclosure document — which offered an unprecedented trove of insight into SpaceX’s business operations — the company stated it intends to launch satellites to orbit aboard Starship “in the second half of 2026.”
SpaceX will be looking to turn Starship into a money-making operation soon, as it’s been an enormous financial drag.
The company spent about $3 billion on “research and development” for Stasrship in 2025 — when it also logged an overall loss of $4.9 billion. SpaceX then poured about another $1 billion into the test program in the first three months of this year.
But spending big piles of cash on getting Starship to work is part of a longer-term strategy, SpaceX states in its prospectus. When the rocket is operational, it notes, it will make a paradigm-shifting impact and will be “the key enabler of our long-term growth strategy.”
SpaceX employees roar in celebration
SpaceX’s Dan Huot acknowledged the roars of excited employees on the livestream, noting there was a “pretty happy crowd in the control room behind me.”
Huot also said the landing was “on target,” indicating the Starship touched down in the right place despite its engines woes.
Starship has splashed down
A booming thunder of cheers rang out on SpaceX’s webcast at the Starship spacecraft accomplished a stunning feat: manging to swing itself upright and complete a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean — despite operating without one of its six engines.
Starship will attempt landing move with one engine out
Despite ample warnings that Starship might not survive re-entry, the vehicle is still in one piece and delivering stunning live views.
But it’s not over yet. The vehicle still needs to swoop upright and re-ignite its engines for a controlled landing. Ideally, the ship would use three engines for this step — but it can only use two under these circumstances.
SpaceX will carry out a stress test for Starship
SpaceX’s webcast hosts have given ample warning that things may start going haywire soon.
One reason: The company is stressing Starship to the limit.
“As a reminder, we are going to be doing some stress work on this ship, where we’re going to do a maneuver where we kind of kick the nose up to fully deploy those aft flaps to really get a good test of the structural strength of that part of the ship,” SpaceX’s Dan Huot said. “We did that on one previous flight test on Version 2.”
One setback: The propellant tanks are more full than expected. So, Huot said, “that’s going to put a little bit of extra stress on those forward flaps as we come in, so we will see if they’re able to hold through that reentry.”
Starship glows with bright pink plasma
A vibrant magenta glow is emanating from Starship — one of the hallmarks of the moment of reentry, as the vehicle plunges back into the thick inner band of Earth’s atmosphere.
Things could get dicey, however, given Starship’s engine issue on this flight.
“We do anticipate that it might be a little bit of a spicy re-entry, so we’ll see how far we get,” said SpaceX’s Kate Tice.
SpaceX releases stunning footage captured by mock satellite
One of the fake satellites that Starship ejected has already beamed down footage it captured as it was sailing away from the spacecraft after being ejected from the payload hatch.
Engineers plan to use the imagery to study the spacecraft’s heat shield.
Watching Starship splash down is "magical"
Suren Sanai, recovery engineer for SpaceX, joined the live broadcast from the recovery ship a couple hundred miles off the coast of Australia.
The recovery team’s primary goal is clearing the range, or making sure no other ships are in the area so the rocket can land, as well as conduct imagery of the rocket as it reenters and splashes down.
“It feels awesome just by being on the boat, not seeing any land for miles and miles, and then hearing the Starship crack down with its sonic booms, and watching it breeze through the sky,” Sanai said of splashdown. “It is one of the most magical feelings on Earth, and really excited to feel that again today.”
Here's how much Elon Musk is getting paid by SpaceX
SpaceX filed some IPO paperwork on Wednesday, giving the public insight into some fascinating tidbits about the company’s operations — including the finances of its infamous CEO.
The annual take-home pay is less than you’d think: Elon Musk has taken the same $54,080 in salary every year since 2019.
But that’s far from the end of the story.
SpaceX also said that Musk will be compensated in 15 tranches of 66,666,665 shares to be paid out in $500 billion increments up to $7.5 trillion as SpaceX hits certain milestones.
Musk will only get all of those shares if the company achieves various stock market valuation milestones and — in true gradiose SpaceX fashion — achieves the company’s founding mission of establishing a self-sustaining city on Mars.
Yes, really. That’s spelled out in the company’s paperwork: Musk’s payout depends on “the Company’s establishment of a permanent human colony on Mars with at least one million inhabitants.”
Government oversight officials are worried about Starship. Here's why
NASA watchdogs have raised concerns about Starship’s complexity and the daunting technical risks associated with using the vehicle for a moon landing “given its intricate operational design, complex concept of operations, and challenges during their ongoing flight test program,” according to a recently published report by NASA’s independent safety advisory group, the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel.
Another report from NASA’s Inspector General notes that “gaps exist” in the “testing posture and crew survival analyses” of Starship.
“If the landers encounter a catastrophic event, NASA knows it would not have the capability to rescue stranded astronauts from space or the lunar surface,” the report noted.
SpaceX has not directly responded to the reports.
But in an October 2025 statement, the company said this:
SpaceX is working under contracts worth up to about $4 billion with NASA, and the company has highlighted that the deal is “fixed-price,” meaning SpaceX doesn’t get more money if it lags behind or development doesn’t go as intended.
Starship will skip a key engine test
The Starship spacecraft, or Ship, had been slated to attempt to relight one of its engines mid-flight.
But because of the issue that left the Ship with only five of six engines working during the initial burn, SpaceX is skipping that demo today.
Powering engines on and off within the vacuum of space is “a critical capability,” SpaceX’s Dan Huot noted during a similar test run in October. At the time, Huot also noted that the engine reignition tests are also designed to help SpaceX figure out how Starship will conduct a deorbit burn, or a maneuver intended to steer the vehicle back toward dry land after it finishes its mission in space.
Despite the engine issues, Huot confirmed today that the Ship’s engines should be able to power on to help steer the vehicle to a controlled landing.
SpaceX previously accomplished an engine relight test on Flight 6 in November 2024, Flight 10 in August, and Flight 11 in October. But the Raptor engines powering this vehicle have undergone a substantial redesign.
See how Starship stacks up to the largest rockets ever
Starship is the biggest rocket ever created — by far.
The towering megarocket stands at nearly 400 feet (121 meters) tall and, with the debut of Version 3, is expected to pack 18 million pounds of force at liftoff.
Here’s how it stacks up to some of the largest rockets ever constructed, past and present.
- Saturn V: The famous NASA rocket that powered the Apollo moon landings of the 20th century put out about 7.6 million pounds of thrust at takeoff. That’s still less than half of Starship’s expected power. It stood at about 360 feet (110 meters) tall.
- Russian N1 rocket: This was Russia’s megamoon rocket of the 20th-century space race. And while it was never operational (all four launch attempts failed), Musk has said it’s the closest relative of Starship’s design. The N1 was expected to give off more than 10 million pounds of thrust at liftoff — still well below Starship’s specs.
- The Space Shuttle: NASA’s workhorse launch system in the post-Apollo era, the shuttle had two solid rocket boosters that gave off about 5.3 million pounds of force at liftoff. It was about 180 feet (55 meters) tall.
- Falcon Heavy: SpaceX’s own 230-foot-tall (70-meter-tall) rocket that previously held the title for most powerful operational rocket in the world. It has about 5 million pounds of thrust.
- Space Launch System: NASA’s new moon rocket, which powered the historic Artemis II lunar flyby mission in April, is currently the most powerful rocket in operation. It produces about 8.8 million pounds of thrust — less than half the Starship V3’s expected output at liftoff. SLS’s Block 1 variant is about 322 feet (98.15 meters) tall.
Starship is deploying dummy satellites
The Starship spacecraft is working to spit out a set of 22 mock satellites.
It’s not the first time the spacecraft, or “Ship,” has completed such a test run, aiming to simulate how future Starship vehicles will deploy functioning, internet-beaming Starlink satellites into orbit. But both the Ship and dummy payloads will be discarded into the ocean after this test flight, as they’re not on a path that would keep them in a stable orbit around Earth.
But one element of the dummy satellite test today stands apart: On this mission, two satellites are expected to be able scan the Starship spacecraft’s heat shield — which is the coating of hexagonal black tiles on its exterior.
The goal is to beam images back down to mission control, giving engineering insight into how they can analyze the heat shield. It’s all part of the company’s goal to gather data, informing how the Ship might one day be returned back to dry land, captured safely by a metal tower and quickly used again for another flight.
Reusability is the name of the game here: SpaceX’s ultimate goal is to make virtually the entire Starship vehicle capable of flying more than once — driving down the cost of each mission.
Starship is "within bounds" but not in exactly the right orbit
The engine outage on Starship was less than ideal: “I wouldn’t call it nominal orbital insertion,” SpaceX’s Dan Huot said. “But we’re in an on a trajectory that we had analyzed, and it’s within bounds.”
