Space launch costs have fallen dramatically over the past six decades, transforming the economics of access to orbit. Drawing on more than 4,400 launches, Dr Alessio Terzi and Francesco Nicoli find an exceptionally rapid rate of technological learning and project further cost reductions to around $300/kg by 2040, while highlighting geopolitical, market and orbital-debris challenges that could constrain progress.
Abstract
Space launch costs have fallen dramatically over the past six decades, opening new economic and scientific frontiers. Yet precise, long-term estimates of these cost reductions remain sparse, and the underlying rate of technological learning is poorly understood. We introduce the largest standardized dataset of rocket launches to date, covering more than 4,400 launches (1960 to 2025) across 16 spacefaring geographical entities and show that the average cost of sending a kilogram to orbit has dropped from 87,023 USD in 1960 to 3,868 USD in 2025. Using a Wright’s Law framework, we estimate that for each doubling of cumulative payload to orbit, the average cost of sending a kilogram to orbit decreases by 21.2%, revealing an exceptionally steep experience curve, outpacing that of other transformative technologies, including 19th-century steamship freight and modern solar photovoltaics. We leverage our empirical model to produce out-of-sample projections under a set of scenario-based and data-driven approaches. In our central estimate, the average cost is expected to fall to 1,600 USD/kg by 2030 and 300 USD/kg by 2040. Nonetheless, geopolitical shifts, potential monopolistic behavior in commercial launch markets, and the rising challenges of orbital debris may temper these gains. Overall, our findings underscore the importance of continued research and policy focus on launch technology, given that breakthroughs in cost reduction could accelerate the evolution of the space economy and its diverse near-term applications.
Read the paper on the PNAS Nexus website
