{"id":657356,"date":"2026-06-25T10:57:08","date_gmt":"2026-06-25T10:57:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/657356\/"},"modified":"2026-06-25T10:57:08","modified_gmt":"2026-06-25T10:57:08","slug":"is-space-tourism-finally-ready-for-takeoff","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/657356\/","title":{"rendered":"Is Space Tourism Finally Ready for Takeoff?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 2001, Dennis Tito, an American entrepreneur, paid a reported $20 million for a voyage to the International Space Station aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft, officially becoming the first space tourist<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was eight days of euphoria,\u201d he said from the steppes of Kazakhstan after returning to Earth.<\/p>\n

The modern space tourism landscape is more robust and commercial than when Mr. Tito took flight. For one, it is dominated by private, billionaire-led companies: Richard Branson\u2019s Virgin Galactic, Elon Musk\u2019s SpaceX and Jeff Bezos\u2019 Blue Origin lead the way, though their short-term plans have diverged in recent months.<\/p>\n

As of this year, about 140 people<\/a> have traveled to space as tourists, most of them on short trips to and from the edge of the atmosphere. But broader plans for more ambitious spaceflights \u2014 trips that take passengers on longer journeys, in orbit \u2014 haven\u2019t materialized beyond a handful of billionaire-financed exceptions. All the while, the development of a wider market for space tourism has been hampered by delays, rising costs and shifting corporate and governmental priorities.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s what to know about the current state of space tourism and where it might be heading.<\/p>\n

The Suborbital Experience<\/p>\n

Today, a vast majority of commercial spaceflights are suborbital, and Mr. Branson\u2019s Virgin Galactic is the main provider. In a round trip of about 90 minutes, tourists ascend close to the K\u00e1rm\u00e1n line, the internationally recognized boundary for space, about 62 miles above sea level, where they experience several minutes of weightlessness.<\/p>\n

Jamila Gilbert flew aboard Virgin Galactic\u2019s final test flight before it began offering commercial services in 2023. In a recent interview, she said she remembered unstrapping her seatbelt and floating around inside the cabin while Earth loomed ethereally outside her window. \u201cEverything that you have ever known has lived within the bounds of it,\u201d she said, \u201cand all of a sudden you\u2019re looking at it from above.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before the flight to space, tourists must undergo three days of training at the company\u2019s Spaceport America<\/a>, in New Mexico, which includes medical checks, mission briefings and both physical and mental preparation.<\/p>\n

On launch day, a Virgin Galactic carrier plane called the Virgin MotherShip climbs for about 50 minutes to around 50,000 feet, before releasing the attached spaceship that will ferry passengers the rest of the way to the K\u00e1rm\u00e1n line.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you escape the atmosphere,\u201d said Ms. Gilbert, \u201cyou\u2019re suddenly in the quietest place you\u2019ve ever been.\u201d<\/p>\n

Virgin Galactic has flown 32 passengers to space since 2018. The price of a ticket was initially $200,000, and it has climbed steadily since. After a two-year pause, the company resumed ticket sales this year with a price tag of $750,000 per seat. This summer, the company is testing its new SpaceShip<\/a>, which increases passenger capacity to six, up from four. Suborbital trips are expected to resume by the end of the year.<\/p>\n

There are around 650 passengers waiting for a spot aboard a Virgin Galactic flight. But if all goes to plan, most are expected to fly by 2027 or 2028, when the company said it plans to have the capability to fly 750 passengers to space per year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have people who wanted to fly to space their whole lives,\u201d said Clare Pelly, the vice president for astronaut operations, \u201cincluding some who saw the moon landing and said, \u2018I will do that one day.\u2019\u201d The company\u2019s customers, she said, are joined more by a shared set of values and life goals than a particular demographic, and 60 countries are represented on the waiting list.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sounds a little cheesy,\u201d said Ms. Pelly, \u201cbut we deal with people\u2019s lives and dreams.\u201d<\/p>\n

The company estimates that around 300,000 people globally have the appropriate net worth and desire to take part in a suborbital trip, a number that company officials predict will grow about 8 percent annually.<\/p>\n

Virgin Galactic said it planned to substantially increase the accessibility of suborbital space travel in coming years as it adds new flights. Several more spaceships are being built, and there are plans for at least one more spaceport in Europe or the Middle East.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust like summiting Everest isn\u2019t going to be for everyone, neither will flying to space,\u201d said Ms. Gilbert. \u201cBut the optionality that was never there before to have this experience is alive and well now.\u201d<\/p>\n

Others may be getting out of the tourism game. Blue Origin, Mr. Bezos\u2019 competing operation, announced after the completion of its 38th successful suborbital trip in January<\/a> that it would pause its New Shepard private passenger program for at least two years. In suspending its suborbital operations, the company said that it would instead focus on building an orbital rocket<\/a> and developing a lunar lander for NASA<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Unlike Virgin Galactic, whose vehicles take off like normal airplanes, Blue Origin rockets launch vertically, and their suborbital flights last about 11 minutes. A total of 92 people have flown to space aboard the New Shepard reusable rocket, which flies autonomously.<\/p>\n

Orbital Travel, and the Future<\/p>\n

Compared with suborbital travel, orbital trips are far more technically challenging and require that spacecraft reach significantly higher speeds.<\/p>\n

SpaceX, Mr. Musk\u2019s company, offers tourists the opportunity to enter orbit aboard Crew Dragon<\/a>, billed as \u201cthe first private spacecraft to take humans to the space station.\u201d These private trips last three to six days, require up to nine months of extensive training and cost about $200 million for four passengers. So far, about two dozen tourists have made the journey, including a cryptocurrency tycoon<\/a>, an e-commerce billionaire<\/a> and the friend of a sweepstakes winner<\/a>. (Like Blue Origin, SpaceX is also working to build a lunar lander for NASA, though lunar tourism is still only in early planning stages.)<\/p>\n

Axiom Space<\/a>, a Houston-based company, has taken more than 20 private passengers since 2022 on SpaceX rockets to stay on the International Space Station. Tickets cost from about $55 million to $65 million per seat, with trips lasting up to about two weeks. Axiom is also competing to build the space station\u2019s replacement \u2014 NASA and its international partners plan to discontinue the I.S.S. at the end of 2030 \u2014 as the world\u2019s first commercial space station.<\/p>\n

Some experts, like Rachel Fu, a professor of tourism and hospitality at the University of Florida<\/a>, predict that a plethora of tourist experiences will become available in the coming years \u2014 orbital hotels, research labs, lunar missions.<\/p>\n

Others predict that as more entities begin operating in space, a more crowded ecosystem will bring new challenges, including how countries and companies will coexist there.<\/p>\n

The defining question, Dr. Fu said, is no longer \u201cCan we go?\u201d but rather \u201cCan we stay, operate and thrive?\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"In 2001, Dennis Tito, an American entrepreneur, paid a reported $20 million for a voyage to the International…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":657357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[220653,91223,4355,81651,15865,189138,407,220654,13934,9027,189137,188809,65571,90,416,7018,12990,208907,191624,56,54,55,78790],"class_list":["post-657356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-axiom-space-inc","tag-bezos","tag-blue-origin","tag-branson","tag-elon","tag-fees-and-rates","tag-international-space-station","tag-jeffrey-p","tag-musk","tag-national-aeronautics-and-space-administration","tag-prices-fares","tag-private-spaceflight","tag-richard","tag-science","tag-space","tag-space-and-astronomy","tag-space-exploration-technologies-corp","tag-spaceport-america","tag-travel-and-vacations","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom","tag-virgin-galactic"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=657356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/657357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=657356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=657356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=657356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}