SpaceX performed its 133rd Falcon 9 launch of 2025 on Wednesday, setting a new record for the number of launches achieved in a single year.
The spaceflight company’s workhorse rocket lifted off from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 7:16 a.m. PT, carrying 28 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit.
SpaceX shared footage of the launch on X, which you can watch below:
Watch Falcon 9 launch 28 @Starlink satellites to orbit from California https://t.co/jbjtkXfCHa
About eight minutes after launch, the first-stage booster made a perfect landing on the Of Course I Still Love You droneship stationed in the Pacific Ocean.
Wednesday’s mission marked the 21st flight for this particular first-stage booster, which previously launched SDA-0A, SARah-2, Transporter-11, and now 18 Starlink missions. Once checked and refurbished, the booster will be able to go again.
SpaceX has been setting new launch records with the Falcon 9 rocket every year since 2020.
With more than two months to go in 2025, SpaceX will add significantly to its Falcon 9 launch count. In the remaining days of this month alone, the Elon Musk-led company has another six launches planned, with all but one of them deploying more of its Starlink internet satellites, of which there are now around 8,000 in low-Earth orbit.
Besides Starlink deployments, the Falcon 9 is also used to launch satellites big and small for companies, organizations, and governments around the world. It also launches crew and cargo to the International Space Station, as well as the occasional privately funded crewed mission to low-Earth orbit.
While the Falcon 9’s launch frequency shows no sign of slowing, SpaceX is also spending a lot of time on the development of its next-generation Starship rocket, which generates 10 times more thrust at launch than the Falcon 9.
SpaceX has flown the Starship rocket 11 times up to now as it readies the massive vehicle for crew and cargo flights to the moon, Mars, and possibly beyond.
After 13 suborbital test flights and more than $15 billion in development costs, SpaceX's Starship has finally reached orbit. The 407-foot megarocket, the most powerful ever built, lifted off from Starbase, Texas, on Monday and delivered its first real payload on it's 14th attempt. The celebration came with an asterisk, though, since SpaceX had to cut the planned 10-hour mission to roughly three hours.
https://twitter.com/SpaceX/status/2104601695711904180
SpaceX is finally ready to give Starship its biggest test yet. The company says the massive rocket's 14th test flight is scheduled for September 22, when it will attempt to put the upper stage into Earth orbit for the first time. The launch is currently pending regulatory approval, with a 75-minute window opening at 7:15 a.m. CT.
Starship has 26 Starlink satellites to deliver
For decades, humanity has looked up at the Moon and wondered what it would be like to live on it. Think sprawling cities, factories, research centers, and permanent human settlements. Unfortunately, there is one fairly fundamental problem with that vision.
A new study published in Frontiers in Space Technologies argues that even the Moon's potentially enormous reserves of frozen water may be nowhere near enough to support city-sized populations sustainably. Researchers Martin Elvis and Jonathan McDowell estimate that the permanently shadowed regions near the lunar poles could contain roughly one billion tons of water. It sounds like an extraordinary amount until you put a million thirsty humans next to it.