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The global launch market reached $14.1 billion in 2024 — up 34% since 2021.
| Attribute | GSLV Mk III (LVM3) 🇮🇳 India Trust: Agency-primaryⓘ Last verified Active · Last updated 2026-06-01Remove × | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Company | Galactic Energy | ExPace (CASIC subsidiary) | ISRO |
| Country | 🇨🇳 China | 🇨🇳 China | 🇮🇳 India |
| Status | Active | Active | Active |
| Vehicle class | Small | Small | Heavy |
| Propellant | Solid (stages 1–3) + hydrazine liquid upper stage | Solid (3 stages) + liquid upper stage | Solid (S200 boosters) + UDMH/N₂O₄ (L110) + LH₂/LOX (C25) |
| Reusable | No | No | No |
| Stages | 4 | 4 | 3 |
| First flight | 2020 | 2020 | 2017 |
| Payload to LEO | 400 kgas of [1]300 kg to SSO. | 1,500 kgas of [1] | 10,000 kgas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Payload to GTO | — | — | 4,000 kgas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Height | 20 mas of [1] | — | 43.43 mas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Liftoff mass | 33 tas of [1] | 78 tas of [1]Transporter-erector-launcher (TEL) capable. | 643 tas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Success rate | 91.3% (21/23)as of [1] | 80% (4/5)as of [1]Debut flight (2020-07-10) failed; returned to flight 2022-12-07 successfully. ↑ Best | 100%as of [2]10/10 missions since development flight 2014 (D1). Production flights since 2017. |
| Total flights | 23as of [1] ↑ Best | 5as of [1] | 10as of [2] |
| Cost / kg LEO | ~$4.5M per launchas of [1]Total launch price, not a per-kg figure. ↓ Cheapest | — | ~$4,500/kgas of [1]Estimated from OneWeb commercial contract ~$450M for 36 satellites (~5 tonne batch to GTO) |
| Summary | Galactic Energy's workhorse small-lift solid rocket — one of the most-flown Chinese commercial launchers — with a sea-launch variant (Ceres-1S, debuted Sep 2023) and a larger Ceres-2 in development. | The larger sibling of Kuaizhou-1A, roughly 3.75x the payload class, road-mobile and solid-fueled, recovering commercial cadence after a 2020 debut failure. | India's most powerful rocket. Launched Chandrayaan-3 (Moon lander) in Jul 2023 and OneWeb internet satellites commercially. Renamed LVM3 (Launch Vehicle Mark 3) in 2022. The CE-20 cryogenic engine was entirely ISRO-developed — previously India depended on Russian technology for the GSLV Mk II. |
48 launch vehicles across 10 countries — active, retired, and in development — with primary-source citations from manufacturer user guides and agency press kits. Pure URL state: bookmark or share the link and the comparison reproduces exactly.