SpaceX Starship – SpaceX plans a May 19 launch of Starship flight 12—its first since October 2025 and the 12th overall since April 2023—using a new Version 3 rocket shaped by faster fueling, upgraded launch-pad systems, and a tight timeline toward NASA’s Artemis lunar campaign.
When SpaceX counts down toward May 19, it won’t just be another test firing of the world’s biggest rocket. The company is preparing to risk a launch sequence built around new hardware upgrades. a Gulf of America landing plan for the booster. and an urgent objective that runs straight through NASA’s Artemis program.
SpaceX says it is aiming for a Tuesday launch of Starship—referred to as flight 12—with the launch window scheduled to open at 6:30 p.m. ET from SpaceX’s Starbase company town and headquarters near the U.S.-Mexico border in Texas.
This mission comes after a long stretch of milestones: it would be the first Starship launch since October 2025 and the 12th overall launch of the largest rocket SpaceX has ever built since the program’s debut in April 2023.
For SpaceX, flight 12 is a bridge between what the rocket can do today and what it needs to do next. The company is also racing to have a lunar lander configuration of Starship ready for astronaut moon landings under NASA’s Artemis campaign.
The next Starship will use Version 3, SpaceX’s most upgraded version yet. SpaceX says both the Super Heavy booster and the upper stage—often called “Ship”—received significant upgrades ahead of the launch.
If Version 3 performs as planned. SpaceX says it could become the model that finally reaches orbit and refuels its upper stage midflight through an orbital fuel transfer process using another Starship vehicle. SpaceX describes that capability as necessary for the rocket to reach the moon and transport humans deeper into space.
The rocket itself is huge. SpaceX says the fully stacked Version 3 Starship is approximately 407 feet tall—about 4 feet taller than its predecessor—and more powerful than any iteration that has launched to date.
It is built from two main parts: a 236-feet-tall lower-stage booster named Super Heavy. and a 171-feet-tall upper stage called Starship. The booster is powered by 33 of SpaceX’s Raptor-class engines. Those engines provide the initial thrust at liftoff. while the upper stage is where crew and cargo would ride in orbit after the stages separate.
Flight 12’s purpose is narrower than the full ambition of lunar and beyond-moon missions, even if it’s meant to serve them. SpaceX says the main objective is to test the new pieces of hardware “in the flight environment for the first time.”
That includes pushing the Super Heavy booster’s performance again without attempting a return-and-land at the launch site. SpaceX says the booster will land in the Gulf of Mexico, which has been renamed in the U.S. under an executive order as the Gulf of America.
On the upper stage, SpaceX plans to deploy 22 mock versions of Starlink satellites. The company says it intends to intentionally test the limits of what the spacecraft can do. SpaceX is still working toward having an upper stage that can return to the launch site.
The setting for that test has also changed. For flight 12, SpaceX says Starship will launch from a completely new launch pad at Starbase: Pad 2.
SpaceX says Pad 2 has an upgraded “propellant farm” with increased storage capacity and more pumps. designed to enable faster vehicle filling for launch. The launch tower’s mechanical arms, known as “chopsticks” and tasked with catching a returning booster, are now shorter. SpaceX says the change is meant to help them move more quickly to track and secure Super Heavy as it descends.
Those operational choices sit inside a bigger commercial and political race: SpaceX is building a fully reusable transportation system that can return both the rocket and spacecraft to the ground for additional missions. The same platform is intended to carry larger versions of SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites and other payloads to space.
SpaceX is also competing with Blue Origin to develop a lunar lander for NASA astronauts under the Artemis program. Elon Musk has described Starship as the vehicle that could transport the first humans to Mars. while in February he announced SpaceX’s intention to shift focus to building a lunar city first.
The pressure on flight 12 is sharpened by what has happened since the program’s first Starship launch in April 2023. SpaceX’s early tests included anomalies and failures that produced premature explosions, along with fiery mishaps on both the test stand and mid-flight.
Still, the company has also accumulated real progress across 11 flight tests to date. Starship has deployed mock Starlink satellites twice. reused a Super Heavy booster twice. and caught a returning booster back at the launch site three times with the “chopsticks.” The upper stage. meanwhile. has consistently flown at a suborbital height—traveling halfway around the world while landing in the Indian Ocean.
The sequence of decisions around flight 12 points to a familiar pattern: SpaceX keeps refining the mechanics of reusability and the pacing of launch preparation. while pushing more demanding upper-stage tasks step by step. This time. the upgrades at Pad 2 and the decision not to attempt a booster return to the site are paired with an upper-stage deployment plan that tests satellite-carrying limits and forces the system to prove it can handle flight conditions for new hardware.
As May 19 approaches, the launch itself becomes more than a technical milestone. Starship flight 12 is scheduled as a test of upgraded components that SpaceX believes could lead toward orbit. midflight refueling. and eventually the lunar configuration tied to NASA’s Artemis campaign—an objective the company is working to meet while it continues to prove its rocket can come back for more attempts.
SpaceX Starship flight 12 May 19 Version 3 Artemis NASA lunar lander Super Heavy Pad 2 chopsticks Starlink mock satellites Gulf of America Raptor engines Starbase