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| Attribute | Long March 6 (incl. 6A / 6C variants) 🇨🇳 China Trust: Operator-primaryⓘ Last verified Active · Last updated 2026-07-26Remove × | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Company | SAST (Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology) / CASC | Isar Aerospace | CASC / SAST |
| Country | 🇨🇳 China | 🇩🇪 Germany | 🇨🇳 China |
| Status | Active | In Development | Active |
| Vehicle class | Medium | Small | Medium |
| Propellant | RP-1 / LOX (stages 1–2); N2O4/UDMH (stage 3, base variant) | LOX / kerosene (~80% manufactured in-house) | UDMH / N₂O₄ (hypergolic all stages) |
| Reusable | No | No | No |
| Stages | 3 | 2 | 2 |
| First flight | 2015 | 2025 | 1992 |
| Payload to LEO | 1,080 kg to SSO (base Long March 6)as of [1]Long March 6A (4 solid boosters, elongated stage 1): at least 4,000 kg to SSO. Long March 6C: similar class without the boosters. Both variants first flew from Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center. ↑ Best | 1,000 kgas of [1] | 3,500 kgas of [1]SSO capacity ~1,300 kg; standard LEO 3,500 kg |
| Payload to GTO | — | — | — |
| Height | 29 m (base variant)as of [1] | — | 41.06 mas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Liftoff mass | 103 t (base variant)as of [1] | — | 232 tas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Success rate | 100% (base Long March 6, 15/15)as of [1]6A first flew 2022-03-29, 6C first flew 2024-05-07; both maintain perfect records within their own flight histories as of this date. ↑ Best | 0/1 (first flight failed)as of [1]First flight from Andøya Spaceport (2025-03-30): liftoff succeeded but the rocket was terminated ~30 seconds in after a vent valve opened unexpectedly, causing loss of attitude control. Second flight ('Onward and Upward') repeatedly delayed through 2026 (weather, a safety-zone fishing vessel, a composite pressure vessel leak, then off-nominal fluid-system behavior as of 2026-06-15) — not yet flown as of this research. | 98.7%as of [2]~77/78 successes; one known failure (CZ-2D Y7, Mar 1995 upper-stage anomaly) |
| Total flights | 15 (base variant)as of [1] | 1as of [1] | ~78as of [2] ↑ Best |
| Cost / kg LEO | — | — | — |
| Summary | A family of medium-lift launchers from SAST serving China's growing SSO/LEO commercial and government satellite demand, with the 6A and 6C variants adding solid boosters or a simplified expendable configuration respectively. | Germany's first orbital-class launcher attempt; its first flight in March 2025 was Western Europe's first orbital launch attempt from the European mainland. A qualification second flight carrying CubeSats and ESA experiments has slipped repeatedly through 2026. | China's most-used sun-synchronous and polar orbit workhorse for small-to-medium military and commercial Earth observation satellites. Launched from Jiuquan and Taiyuan. Uses storable hypergolic propellants for high launch-readiness but produces toxic exhaust. |
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.