Musk: Starship could put up to 10 million tons of cargo into orbit per year

Elon Musk has said the Starship rocket system could eventually deliver up to 10 million tons of payload to orbit annually. He argued that such volumes are required to build a sustainable civilization beyond Earth.

The SpaceX founder noted that Starship would raise yearly tonnage from roughly 2,500 tons to over a million, and ultimately to 10 million tons. He stressed that without moving millions of tons to low Earth orbit, it would be impossible to send the same volumes of cargo needed to become a self-sustaining multiplanet species.

Musk called Starship perhaps the most complex engineering endeavor humanity has ever attempted. He praised the team's work on engines, avionics, and the vehicle's structure.

Earlier reports said SpaceX aims to launch Starship more than once an hour — over 10,000 launches per year, with a capacity exceeding 200 tons per flight. That intensity would make the millions of tons achievable. To support this, the company is preparing for mass production of up to 10,000 ships annually at new Gigabay facilities.

The figures tie into Musk's Mars colonization plan: he previously estimated a self-sufficient colony would need at least 100,000 people and 1 million tons of cargo.