Gravity-1
Orienspace (Orient Space)
Orienspace's solid-fuel heavy launch vehicle — the world's most powerful solid rocket — delivering 6,500 kg to SSO from sea launch in January 2024.
Key figurescomparable across the catalogue
- Payload capacity
- 6,500 kg
Normalised to common units so this product can be compared with others in its category. The supplier's own wording is below.
As published by the supplier
- Propulsion
- All solid (4× CAS-250 first stage)
- Payload to SSO
- 6,500 kg (500 km)
- Payload to LEO
- ~14,000 kg
- First Flight
- January 11, 2024 (success from sea launch)
- Achievement
- World's most powerful solid-fuel rocket; world record solid rocket payload to orbit
- Launch Mode
- Sea launch platform (Yellow Sea)
About
Gravity-1 (Yinli-1) is a commercial solid-propellant orbital launch vehicle developed by Orient Space (Orienspace, Beijing) and the most powerful solid-fuel rocket in the world by payload capacity. The vehicle completed its inaugural flight on January 11, 2024, launching from a sea platform in the Yellow Sea and successfully deploying a commercial Earth observation constellation — making Gravity-1 the world’s largest solid-fuel rocket to reach orbit on a first flight.
Gravity-1 uses four CAS-250 solid rocket motors in a clustered first stage, with additional upper stages, delivering approximately 6,500 kg to SSO at 500 km altitude or up to 14,000 kg to LEO. The sea-based launch platform offers flexibility in launch azimuth selection and avoids the range safety constraints of land-based spaceports, enabling optimized SSO injection for Earth observation constellations.
Orienspace plans to follow Gravity-1 with Gravity-2, a liquid-propellant reusable vehicle targeting 20,000 kg to LEO in a partially reusable configuration, and Gravity-3, a heavy-lift vehicle targeting 60,000 kg to LEO — positioning the company as a significant player in China’s commercial heavy lift market.
Documentation
No public datasheet yet — request the datasheet / ICD from the supplier.