Falcon Heavy vs Starship: Similarities and Differences

Here we are with a new “episode” of the “SpaceX Saga”! In the last episode we compared “Falcon 9 vs Falcon Heavy“, two rockets that are so similar, we identified them as siblings. In this episode, we tackle the comparison of Falcon Heavy vs Starship. As visible in the graphic below, this will be full of differences. However, our mission will be to find similarities even between those two rockets. Let’s start with a little introduction to the subjects!

Falcon Heavy vs Starship: Two different SpaceX projects

The Falcon Heavy is an extension of the Falcon 9’s project. Falcon Heavy, as the name suggests, is the heaviest version of Falcon 9: same engines, same stages, but different thrust! The difference in thrust is due to the presence of two strap-on boosters; each of them has the same number of engines as the first stage. This thrust enabled the heaviest payload capability among the active rockets.
The huge capability of Falcon Heavy is usually used to carry military or government payloads. One such example is its last launch, on November 1st, which had on board a USSF mission.

This is just a small overview on the challenging project of Starship. If you want to go deeper, read the Technical Capsule on SpaceX’s Starship Project. What do you have to know to understand this comparison? Well, the most important part of the project is the development of a rocket not only capable of bringing a man to Mars but also all the materials needed for the construction of a self-sustaining city! For this goal, the rocket designed must not only be very huge and highly capable, but also reusable. The reusability is one of the cornerstones in SpaceX’s development.

Rockets’ Differences

The first difference is the massive difference in the height of the rockets: Falcon Heavy is about 70 m, while Starship is 120 m. The booster of Starship, the Super Heavy, is as tall as all of Falcon Heavy! This difference is reflected even in the maximum diameter and total mass.

	Falcon Heavy	Starship
Height	70 m	120 m
First Stage Height	≈ 40 m	70 m
Diameter of Central Core	3.66 m	9 m
Mass	1 420 tons	5 000 tons

Engines Comparison

For Starship, SpaceX has developed a brand new engine. The Falcon family used the Merlin 1D engine; they used RP-1 and LOX to produce a thrust of 854 kN at sea-level. The first stage and each booster had 9 engines, for a total thrust of 22.8 MN at liftoff for the Falcon Heavy.
The Starship engine is called Raptor and it is a masterpiece of engineering! The version used is the Raptor 2, a more powerful, lighter, and more robust version. Each Raptor uses CH₄ and LOX to produce 2.3 MN of thrust. This is almost three times more than Falcon Heavy! Super Heavy has 33 engines, with a total thrust of 72 MN!

	Falcon Heavy	Starship
Engine Name	Merlin 1D	Raptor 2
Maximum Thrust	854 kN	2.3 MN
Fuel/Oxidizer	RP-1/LOX	CH4/LOX
First Stage’s Engine Number	27	33
Maximum Thrust at sea level	22.8 MN	72 MN

But what about the second stage? This stage has the same engines as the first one: Falcon Heavy has a single Merlin 1D Vacuum, while Starship has 3 Raptor engines and 3 Raptor Vacuum engines.

Payload Capability Comparison

Finally, another important difference, already mentioned in the previous section, is the payload capability. Despite what we said regarding Falcon Heavy being the rocket with the heaviest payload capability among the active ones, the capability of Starship outshines it. Starship wants to place in the Space Races the heaviest payload capability of all time! The only confirmed payload capability for Starship is the Capability to a 500 km, 98.9° LEO which is 100 tons. Don’t worry, we are still looking for the missing values in the table below, so stay tuned to discover them.

Capability	Falcon Heavy	Starship
to LEO, 28.5°	63.8 tons	250 tons (expendable) 150 tons (reusable)
to GTO	26.7 tons
to Mars Transfer Orbit	16.8 tons
to Pluto	3.5 tons

Rockets’ Similarities

In the differences, we did not speak about the number of stages; this is because both Starship and Falcon Heavy have two stages but with some differences. To start off, the first stage of Falcon Heavy is powered by two boosters, meaning the first stage and the booster have parallel staging (check the difference between Serial Staging and Parallel Staging). On the other hand, the second stage of Starship is a giant ship with controls and the capability to come back to Earth.

The reusability is a partial similarity between Falcon Heavy and Starship. In fact, Falcon Heavy is only partially reusable; the reusable parts are the boosters, the first stage, and the fairing halves. This is a big amount of material coming back to Earth, which is why I decided to insert reusability as a similarity. Starship, instead, is designed to be fully reusable; both the booster and the ship will come back to Earth.

Launch Site

After the tests and the first orbital flight, the launch site for Starship will be at Cape Canaveral. The tower that will support the launch of Starship is currently ready. Falcon Heavy is launching too from Cape Canaveral. The last launch, in particular, was from the Launch Pad LC-39A.
But don’t forget the Starbase project! Click here to learn more about it.

When Will the Next Launch Be?

After its fourth launch on Nov 1st, the fifth launch of Falcon Heavy is scheduled for January 4th from Cape Canaveral. It will launch the ViaSat-3 Americas, the Arcturus (Aurora 4A), and G-Space-1 satellites to a GTO. Click here to stay updated on the Falcon Heavy schedule.

The first orbital flight of Starship is scheduled for mid-December from Boca Chica, Texas. This will be the milestone for the Space Race. Hope to see it soon!
Click here to stay updated on the Starship schedule.

Here the comparisons end. If you have any questions or want to deepen some aspect, you need only open the Chatbox and ask.
In the meantime, I will give you an appointment to next Friday, where we will walk through the history of the Apollo program.