SpaceX surpasses 2024 orbital launch record with Saturday Starlink mission

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket flies away from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base on the Starlink 11-12 mission on Oct. 25, 2025. Image: SpaceX

Update Oct. 25, 11:35 a.m. EDT (1535 UTC): SpaceX confirms deployment of the 28 Starlink satellites.

SpaceX kicked off the weekend with a Falcon 9 rocket launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base Saturday morning. This was its 135 Falcon 9 launch of 2025, breaking its record number of orbital launches achieved in all of 2024.

The Starlink 11-12 mission added another 28 broadband satellites to the constellation of more than 8,700 spacecraft in low Earth orbit. SpaceX completed liftoff from Space Launch Complex 4 East at 7:20 a.m. PDT (10:20 a.m. EDT / 1420 UTC).



SpaceX launched the mission using the Falcon 9 first stage booster with the tail number, B1081. This was its 19th launch after previously flying multiple NASA missions, including Crew-7, PACE and TRACERS.

Nearly 8.5 minutes after liftoff, B1081 completed an autonomous landing on the drone ship, ‘Of Course I Still Love You’. This was the 160th landing on this vessel and the 523rd booster landing to date.

The mission came nearly a week after SpaceX launched its 10,000th Starlink satellite to date. Prior to Saturday’s launch, SpaceX had more than 8,700 satellites on orbit, according to statistics maintained by astronomer and expert orbital tracker, Jonathan McDowell.