SpaceX is turning away customers for the rocket that flew most of 2025’s trips to orbit, and some are paying extra for the last seats
Source: Fortune ·
Those who can afford it are paying extra to secure the few remaining slots on Falcon 9, while others are scrambling to find alternative launch opportunities.
From the source
More than 50% of the nearly 330 spaceflights to low Earth orbit in 2025 were done on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Falcon 9 is much smaller than SpaceX’s flashy Starship rocket, but for the past 16 years it has been a reliable choice for launching satellites to orbit. It has carried payloads ranging from Earth-imaging sensors feeding smartphone map apps to environmental monitoring satellites that track wildfires. It has also launched the crew capsule that ferries astronauts to the International Space Station. In late 2026, reports came out that SpaceX is shuffling its staff in an attempt to focus its resources on developing and commercializing Starship, while phasing out the Falcon 9. At face value, this sounds like routine news; after all, companies shuffle resources all the time. But as a space scientist, I believe that retiring this rocket threatens to suffocate the commercial space industry that it helped bring to life – unless the public and private sectors step up their efforts to…