From an apartment to a few cars: The era of $300-per-kg space launch is coming

In 1960, sending a payload equal to a person's body weight into space would have cost a fortune. For 70 kilograms, the price tag was $6.09 million — roughly 9 billion won at today's exchange rate, about the price of a Gangnam apartment.

By 2025, that same calculation yields $270,000, or about 400 million won — the cost of a few cars rather than a prime piece of Seoul real estate. In 65 years, the price of reaching orbit has collapsed.

According to a paper published in PNAS Nexus (Volume 5, Issue 7, 2026) — a journal of the US National Academy of Sciences — the average cost of launching 1 kilogram to low Earth orbit fell from $87,023 in 1960 to $3,868 in 2025. The paper was co-authored by Alessio Terzi, a researcher at the Bennett Institute for Public Policy at the University of Cambridge, and Francesco Nicoli, a professor in the Department of Management and Production Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Turin.

The research team compiled data from 4,405 rocket launches conducted by 16 countries and organizations between 1960 and 2025, covering more than 330 rocket types. The dataset spans the United States, Russia, China, India, Japan and Europe, as well as South Korea, Israel, Iran, Brazil and Australia. The authors say it is the first time launch cost data has been standardized and compiled at this scale.

Wright's 1936 law still holds

The study's analytical framework draws on a principle proposed in 1936 by aeronautical engineer Theodore Wright: every time cumulative output doubles, the unit cost falls by a fixed percentage. Previous research had shown that aircraft, semiconductors and solar panels all follow this so-called learning curve.

Space launches are no exception. Each time the cumulative mass delivered to orbit doubled, the average cost per kilogram dropped by 21.2 percent, in line with Wright's law.

The research team compared the trend with the rapid expansion of solar power. Solar module costs fell 20.2 percent with each doubling of installed capacity between 1975 and 2019, with the price per watt dropping from $130 to $0.31.

In total, solar costs fell 99.8 percent from 1975 to 2023, while space launch costs dropped 85.3 percent over a comparable period. What caught the researchers' attention, however, was how much cumulative volume was needed to drive those declines.

Space launch cost per kilogram by year. [PNAS Nexus, Volume 5, Issue 7, 2026, US National Academy of Sciences]

Solar achieved its dramatic cost reductions by deploying panels across the globe and accumulating vast production volumes. Space launch reached a comparable rate of cost reduction with far less cumulative output — meaning that for the same doubling of experience, the cost savings in space were greater.

The comparison holds even against historical shipping data. After the first steamship crossed the Atlantic in 1819, freight rates for wheat and cotton fell 15.5 percent with each doubling of cargo volume. By the researchers' calculations, rocketry's cost reduction is outpacing the impact the First Industrial Revolution had on global trade.

Launch costs projected to hit $300 per kg by 2040

The research team also used historical data to project future trends.

Assuming orbital payload volume continues to grow at the 2010–2025 average annual rate of 13.3 percent, the team projects the average cost per kilogram will fall to $1,600 by 2030 and $300 by 2040 — roughly one-twelfth of today's level.

Even under a more conservative scenario using only statistical modeling to estimate payload growth, costs are projected to fall 45 percent by 2030 and 75 percent by 2040.

The team also validated their model by using only data through 2015 to predict 2025 costs, then comparing the result against actual figures. The model, it turned out, had underestimated how far costs would fall.

The annual growth rate of orbital payload since 2020 has surged to 31 percent — nearly eight times the 4 percent average recorded from 2000 to 2019. More objects have been launched into space in the past five years than in the preceding five decades.

(A) Annual low-Earth-orbit launch capacity; (B) launch cost per kilogram. [PNAS Nexus, Volume 5, Issue 7, 2026, US National Academy of Sciences]

Under the research team's scenario, humanity's annual low-Earth-orbit launch capacity would reach 9,100 metric tons by 2030 — a volume that SpaceX's fully reusable Starship could handle in about 80 launches. SpaceX launched its partially reusable Falcon 9 more than 165 times in 2025 alone.

Space engineering experts estimate that once Starship achieves full reusability, launch costs would start at around $1,000 per kilogram, potentially falling below $500 as production becomes standardized. Blue Origin's New Glenn is expected to come in at roughly $1,500 per kilogram initially.

Orbital debris, however, remains a wild card. An exponential rise in launches could make low Earth orbit increasingly congested, potentially slowing the growth in payload volume.

The research team added that while space launch technology has advanced at a pace comparable to the Industrial Revolution over the past half-century, the speed at which the space age unfolds will ultimately depend on geopolitical and environmental risks.

Reference

DOI: 10.1093/pnasnexus/pgag217

Alessio Terzi, Francesco Nicoli, "From Sputnik to Starship: Estimating the experience curve of space launch technology," PNAS Nexus, Volume 5, Issue 7, July 2026, pgag217.

dbsdn1110@heraldcorp.com