A leading Chinese rocket developer is targeting a major milestone in reusable spaceflight, aiming to recover a booster stage by mid-2026 in a bid to compete with U.S. aerospace giant SpaceX. The move underscores China’s growing ambitions in commercial space and highlights the strategic importance of reusable rocket technology for reducing costs and expanding global satellite deployment.
Never seen a rocket launch so close. This is China's Zhuque-3 launched yesterday. pic.twitter.com/AYXJtZ925P
— Li Zexin 李泽欣 (@XH_Lee23) December 4, 2025
The ability to launch, return, and reuse a rocket’s first stage is widely regarded as the “holy grail” of modern space economics. SpaceX currently remains the only company to have achieved this at scale, a capability that has allowed it to significantly lower launch costs and dominate the satellite launch market. For LandSpace, achieving booster recovery would represent a major step forward for China’s commercial space sector, making space operations more cost-effective and commercially viable, similar to the economics of civil aviation.
Earlier this month, LandSpace became the first Chinese company to conduct a fully reusable rocket test with the maiden flight of its Zhuque-3 vehicle. Launching from a remote site in northwest China, the flight drew immediate comparisons to SpaceX’s Falcon 9. While the test did not include a successful booster landing, the company has now outlined its timeline for achieving that critical milestone.
Dong Kai, the deputy chief designer of the Zhuque-3, told the Chinese podcast Tech Early Know that LandSpace plans to achieve booster recovery on a second test flight scheduled for mid-2026. “If the second flight’s recovery [stage] succeeds, we plan that on the fourth flight we will use a reused first stage to launch,” Dong said, detailing an aggressive roadmap toward operational reuse.
Currently, SpaceX launches roughly 150 Falcon 9 rockets per year, with individual boosters reused dozens of times. By comparison, Dong said LandSpace has 10 launches planned across all its rocket models in the coming year.
The competition between the two companies has drawn attention from SpaceX founder Elon Musk. In October, Musk acknowledged that the Zhuque-3 design could potentially match or exceed the performance of the Falcon 9. He cautioned, however, that it would take more than five years for LandSpace to reach SpaceX’s launch cadence, by which point SpaceX expects its Starship system to be operational and capable of “doing over 100 times the annual payload to orbit of Falcon.”
Dong Kai responded to Musk’s projections with measured caution. While LandSpace is developing an engine for a future Starship-like rocket, he said matching Falcon 9’s frequency within five years would be “very difficult for a single company” and would require “the support of an entire ecosystem,” noting that the total number of launches in China across all rocket models was only around 100 this year.
Looking ahead, LandSpace is preparing for the Zhuque-3’s second test flight in 2026, focusing on the booster’s landing phase. The company faces additional hurdles, including the financial demands of a high-frequency testing program. Executives have indicated that sustaining a launch cadence similar to SpaceX’s would require substantial capital, and LandSpace has signaled plans for an initial public offering next year to raise funds for its reusable rocket ambitions.
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