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The global launch market reached $14.1 billion in 2024 — up 34% since 2021.
| Attribute | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Company | Khrunichev / Roscosmos | United Launch Alliance | ExPace (CASIC subsidiary) |
| Country | 🇷🇺 Russia | 🇺🇸 USA | 🇨🇳 China |
| Status | Retired | Retired | Active |
| Vehicle class | Heavy | Heavy | Small |
| Propellant | UDMH / N₂O₄ (hypergolic — all stages) | LH2 / LOX | Solid (3 stages) + liquid upper stage |
| Reusable | No | No | No |
| Stages | 3 | 2 | 4 |
| First flight | 2001 – 2023 | 2004 – 2024 | 2020 |
| Payload to LEO | 22,400 kgas of [1] | 28,370 kgas of [1] ↑ Best | 1,500 kgas of [1] |
| Payload to GTO | 6,290 kgas of [1]With Briz-M upper stage ↑ Best | — | — |
| Height | 58.2 mas of [1] | 70.7 mas of [1] ↑ Best | — |
| Liftoff mass | 712 tas of [1] | 733 tas of [1] ↑ Best | 78 tas of [1]Transporter-erector-launcher (TEL) capable. |
| Success rate | ~91%as of [2]~13 mission failures out of ~115 flights in Proton-M variant; highly toxic propellant complicated recovery operations | 93.75% (15/16 full success, 1 partial failure)as of [1] | 80% (4/5)as of [1]Debut flight (2020-07-10) failed; returned to flight 2022-12-07 successfully. ↑ Best |
| Total flights | ~115as of [2]Effectively retired ~2023 with Russian government replacing it with Angara A5 ↑ Best | 16as of [1] | 5as of [1] |
| Cost / kg LEO | — | — | — |
| Summary | 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. | ULA's triple-common-booster-core heavy-lift launcher, retired 2024-04-09 after its final flight; superseded by Vulcan Centaur, which ULA states offers similar heavy-lift capability at lower cost. | 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. |
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.