SpaceX dominates with 134 launches, Polaris Dawn's commercial spacewalk, and Boeing Starliner's crewed crisis.
2024 saw 259 successful orbital launches — the busiest year ever — driven by SpaceX's record-shattering 134 Falcon 9 / Falcon Heavy missions. Boeing's Crew Flight Test Starliner mission stranded astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams on the ISS until February 2025 after thruster anomalies, while Polaris Dawn completed the first all-commercial spacewalk. The global space economy crossed $596 billion (Space Foundation), with launch services growing 15% YoY.
Published April 27, 2026 by SpaceOdysseyHub Editorial.
In 2024, the world conducted 259 successful orbital launches. SpaceX led the manifest with 134 launches, representing roughly 52% of the global cadence.
| Mission | Date | Agency / operator | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| Polaris Dawn — first commercial spacewalk | 2024-09-12 | SpaceX / Polaris Program | Success — Jared Isaacman & Sarah Gillis EVA at ~700 km altitude |
| Boeing Starliner Crew Flight Test (CFT) | 2024-06-05 | Boeing / NASA | Partial — docked successfully, returned uncrewed Sept; crew brought home by Crew-9 in Feb 2025 |
| Starship IFT-4 | 2024-06-06 | SpaceX | Success — both stages survived re-entry; Super Heavy soft splashdown |
| Starship IFT-5 — first chopstick catch | 2024-10-13 | SpaceX | Success — Mechazilla caught Super Heavy booster on first attempt |
| Europa Clipper launch | 2024-10-14 | NASA | Success — Falcon Heavy direct to Jupiter, arrival 2030 |
| Vulcan Centaur Cert-1 / Peregrine | 2024-01-08 | ULA / Astrobotic | Vulcan success; Peregrine lander failed in transit (propellant leak) |
| Intuitive Machines IM-1 'Odysseus' | 2024-02-22 | Intuitive Machines / NASA CLPS | First U.S. soft lunar landing since Apollo 17 (tipped on side) |
| Chang'e 6 lunar far-side sample return | 2024-05-03 | CNSA | Success — first samples from the lunar far side (Apollo basin) |
| Rank | Country | Civil + military space budget |
|---|---|---|
| #1 | United States | $79.7B |
| #2 | China | $19.8B |
| #3 | Japan | $5.6B |
| #4 | France | $4.4B |
| #5 | Russia | $3.5B |
| Company | Ticker | Date |
|---|---|---|
| AST SpaceMobile (secondary offering) | ASTS | 2024-09-19 |
| Loar Holdings (aerospace components) | LOAR | 2024-04-25 |
Looking into 2025, the industry expects Starship orbital reuse, Artemis II crew rollout, Vulcan and New Glenn entering operational service, and direct-to-cell satellite services scaling. Defense space spending is set to keep climbing as Golden Dome / proliferated low-Earth-orbit (pLEO) constellation contracts mature.