Elon Musk Says SpaceX Will Launch Starship 'Every Hour' In Three Years

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has predicted that SpaceX's Starship rocket would be able to launch every hour in the near future.

Increased Launch Cadence

On Wednesday, Musk quoted a post on the social media platform X, which showcased how SpaceX was conducting more launches than its competitors in 2026.

Quoting that post, a user by the name of Brian Basson on X outlined SpaceX's launch timelines for the rest of February, which included 7 Falcon 9 launches from locations in California and Florida. "Total domination by SpaceX!" Basson wrote in his post.

Responding to his post, Musk made the Starship prediction. "It will get really nutty when Starship is launching every hour in 3 years," he said, expressing bullish sentiments over the rocket.

The Starship rocket could be instrumental for SpaceX to fulfill Musk's ambitions of colonizing Mars, as well as SpaceX's pivot away from the Red planet and on to the Moon, in line with NASA's Artemis mission.

Elon Musk's 10,000 Starship Goal, xAI Merger

Last month, Musk had outlined a goal of producing 10,000 units of the Starship rocket annually as SpaceX gears up for its IPO, which will reportedly take place in June, coinciding with Musk's birthday.

SpaceX also acquired Musk's artificial intelligence startup xAI, with the combined SpaceX-xAI entity now valued at close to $1.25 trillion, putting it close to Musk's Tesla Inc. (NASDAQ:TSLA), which has a valuation of over $1.5 trillion and is currently the most valuable carmaker in the world.

Orbital Datacenters

Meanwhile, Musk and the tech industry's goal of putting AI datacenters in orbit via solar-powered satellites was criticized by short seller James Chanos, who termed space-based AI compute as "AI snake oil," while outlining that the endeavor would prove to be costlier than ground-based systems. Starship's development could also help expedite the goal.

On the other hand, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has invited SpaceX to comment on its orbital datacenter plans, which, the agency said, include over 1 million Non-Geostationary Satellites (NSGO) placed close to 2000km above the Earth. The company has also sought several waivers from the agency.

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