SpaceX rounds out third quarter with 70 launches for the year

With today marking the first Monday of October it also marks the start of the first week of the final quarter of 2023. Seriously where has the year gone?

So now is the time to catch up with SpaceX’s 100 launch goal for the year and see if they are anywhere close from hitting it or if they even have the chance.

SpaceX closes out Q3 at a nice round 70

Since the beginning of the year we’ve been keeping track of SpaceX’s launch rate. 2023 was always expected to be a record breaking year for the launch provider with both Starlink and commercial missions being at an all time high.

So far we’ve seen SpaceX launch 70 rockets in the year, beating the company’s 2022 record of 61. This was the company’s fourth straight year of beating its year to date record from the previous year. In 2020 when this current streak started, SpaceX was only able to launch 26 times that year.

Starlink has played a huge role in getting SpaceX’s launch numbers so high. The company began launching Gen 2 “Mini” Starlink satellites to expand but also replace the now four plus year old Gen 1 satellites. Out of the 70 launches so far this year, only 27 were non-Starlink missions, including NASA crewed and cargo flights, some commercial satellite flights, and missions for the DoD.

Of course the Falcon 9 has carried the vast majority of those 70 launches. However, 2023 has been a good year for Falcon Heavy flights from SpaceX. Practically a Falcon 9 with two extra first stages strapped to its sides as boosters, the Falcon Heavy laid dormant for several years since it’s first round of commercial launches in 2019. That changed when the Space Force launched its first mission on a Falcon Heavy at the end of 2022 and since then we’ve seen three more launches this year with a fourth, NASA’s Psyche spacecraft, coming next week.

SpaceX’s total launches and Falcon Heavy isn’t the only record it has this year, or at least it’s tying in 2023. For the third year in a row, SpaceX has launched three crewed missions to space. While we expected to maybe see four, sadly Polaris Dawn won’t launch until next year now, three crewed flights to the ISS is still rather impressive. Especially given SpaceX’s competitor Boeing still hasn’t performed one yet.

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Will SpaceX launch 100 rockets by year’s end?

When looking at the numbers, 2023 is looking to be another great record breaking year for SpaceX with no other company coming close to those numbers. However SpaceX was given a goal from Musk to get to 100 launches this year, which seems to have been harder than we thought it would be.

SpaceX’s current launch rate is one launch ever 3.96 days. That’s just slightly behind the needed 3.65 days to reach 100 launches. While that doesn’t sound like a lot, you’re right it isn’t, it still means we’ll need a big push from SpaceX to launch faster than they ever have before.

To get the final 30 launches in the 90 days left in the year as a publishing this post that would mean one launch ever three days – a rate SpaceX has yet to meet. SpaceX did pick up its rate from the end of Q2 to now. At the year halfway point SpaceX’s launch rate was at 4.05 days, it would be hard to imagine such a drastic rate increase but maybe it is still possible.