Goodbye, Falcon 9: SpaceX plans to retire its workhorse rocket for Starship

SpaceX is preparing to eventually retire its Falcon 9 rocket once Starship becomes reliable enough for regular operational flights. The company’s founder and CEO Elon Musk said in a post on X that SpaceX plans to wind down both Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy and shift production resources to its much larger next-generation rocket.

Once Starship is flying reliably several times per week, it makes sense to shift super scarce SpaceX engineering and production resources to Starship to get launch rate to several times per day, which means winding down Falcon - Elon Musk.

Falcon 9 has been one of the most successful rockets in spaceflight history. SpaceX first launched it in 2010, and the rocket has now flown nearly 700 times. It was the first orbital launch vehicle to land and reuse its first-stage booster, helping make frequent and relatively inexpensive launches possible.

The transition to Starship will not happen overnight. For now, Falcon 9 remains the proven workhorse, while Starship is still in the testing phase. SpaceX’s plans depend on Starship reaching a level of reliability and launch frequency that it has yet to demonstrate. The giant rocket has completed 13 suborbital test flights so far, with another flight expected within the next month and potentially becoming its first attempt to reach orbit.

Starship is significantly larger and more powerful than Falcon 9. The current V3 vehicle stands 124.4 meters tall (408 feet), compared with 70 meters (230 feet) for Falcon 9, and is designed to carry more than 100 tons to low Earth orbit. Falcon 9 can carry around 25 tons, while Falcon Heavy can deliver about 63 tons.

Much of Falcon 9’s recent workload has come from SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network. The rocket has launched more than 300 Starlink missions since 2023, including 122 of its 165 launches in 2025. SpaceX plans to use Starship for its next-generation Starlink satellites, which are larger and designed to fit inside Starship’s payload bay but cannot fit on Falcon 9.

NASA could be another reason Falcon 9 will remain in service for some time. SpaceX is expected to continue using Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon for missions to the International Space Station, which is expected to remain in operation until at least 2030. Starship has not yet been designed or certified to dock with the ISS, and its enormous size would create additional engineering challenges for a rapidly aging station.

SpaceX also has ambitious plans for Starship beyond Earth orbit. NASA has selected a Starship-based lunar lander for the Artemis program, with a special version of the vehicle planned for Artemis III and another expected to support the Artemis IV mission.