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| Attribute | Long March 8 (incl. 8A) 🇨🇳 China Trust: Operator-primaryⓘ Last verified Active · Last updated 2026-07-26Remove × | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Company | China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT) / CASC | CASC / CALT | Khrunichev / Roscosmos |
| Country | 🇨🇳 China | 🇨🇳 China | 🇷🇺 Russia |
| Status | Active | Active | Retired |
| Vehicle class | Medium | Medium | Heavy |
| Propellant | RP-1 / LOX (stage 1); LH2/LOX (stage 2) | RP-1 / LOX (YF-100 + YF-115) | UDMH / N₂O₄ (hypergolic — all stages) |
| Reusable | No | No | No |
| Stages | 2 | 2 | 3 |
| First flight | 2020 | 2016 | 2001 – 2023 |
| Payload to LEO | 8,100 kgas of [1]5,000 kg to 700 km SSO (base); the enlarged-second-stage 8A variant (first flew 2025-02-11) lifts 7,000 kg to the same SSO reference orbit. | 13,500 kgas of [1]SSO capacity ~5,500 kg | 22,400 kgas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Payload to GTO | — | — | 6,290 kgas of [1]With Briz-M upper stage ↑ Best |
| Height | 50.3 mas of [1] | 53.1 mas of [1] | 58.2 mas of [1] ↑ Best |
| Liftoff mass | 356 t (base); 371 t (8A)as of [1] ↑ Best | 597 tas of [1] | 712 tas of [1] |
| Success rate | 100% (16/16 combined base + 8A)as of [1] ↑ Best | 100%as of [2]12/12 missions, all Tianzhou ISS resupply or CZ-7 tech demo flights | ~91%as of [2]~13 mission failures out of ~115 flights in Proton-M variant; highly toxic propellant complicated recovery operations |
| Total flights | 16 (base + 8A combined)as of [1] ↑ Best | 12as of [2]Most recently Tianzhou-10 cargo to Tiangong (May 11, 2026) | ~115as of [2]Effectively retired ~2023 with Russian government replacing it with Angara A5 |
| Cost / kg LEO | — | — | — |
| Summary | A two-stage medium-lift launcher originally designed with a reusable combined-booster-recovery concept in mind, though currently operational vehicles fly expendable. Exclusively from Wenchang. | China's workhorse medium-lift rocket, used exclusively for Tianzhou automated cargo missions to the Tiangong space station. Designed to replace the Long March 2F for high-cadence LEO/cargo missions. Uses the same YF-100 engines as Long March 5's boosters. | Russia's dominant heavy-lift rocket for GEO comsats and planetary missions from 1965 (Proton family) through 2023 (Proton-M). Notorious for its hypergolic propellant — a highly toxic UDMH/N₂O₄ combination that caused environmental concerns at Baikonur. Replaced by Angara A5. |
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.