What Counts as the "Space Economy"?
The space economy is the full value of activity that depends on reaching or using space — satellite services, ground equipment, launch, manufacturing, and the government programmes that underpin them. In 2025 it was worth about $626 billion (Novaspace), and the commercial share — roughly 78% — now dwarfs government spending. That balance has flipped within a generation: space used to be something governments did, and is now mostly something companies sell.
The engine of that shift is the collapse in launch cost. When putting a kilogram in orbit fell from tens of thousands of dollars to under three thousand, whole industries became viable — broadband mega-constellations like Starlink, Earth-observation, and the next wave of commercial stations. Forecasters now expect the economy to reach $1 trillion by the early-to-mid 2030s.
Market-size, sector and company figures are rounded analyst estimates from Novaspace (Space Economy Report), the Space Foundation (Space Report), McKinsey/World Economic Forum and Payload, in current USD; different sources draw segment boundaries differently. Live launch counts, cadence and market share are computed from Orbital Radar's launch database; orbital object counts from our live tracking catalogue, updated continuously.