Topic summary
New Shepard
New Shepard is a fully reusablesub-orbitallaunch vehicle developed for space tourism by Blue Origin. The vehicle is named after Alan Shepard, for being the first American to travel into space, also being the fifth person to walk on the Moon. The vehicle is capable of vertical takeoff and landings. Additionally, it is also capable of carrying humans and customer payloads into a sub-orbital trajectory.
New Shepard consists of a launch rocket and a crew capsule. The capsule can be configured to house up to six passengers, cargo, or a combination of both. The launch rocket is powered by one BE-3PM engine, which sends the capsule above the Kármán line, where passengers and cargo can experience a few minutes of weightlessness before the capsule returns to Earth.
The launch vehicle is designed to be fully reusable, with the capsule returning to Earth via three parachutes and a solid rocket motor. The rocket lands vertically on a landing pad 3.2km north of the launch pad. The company has successfully launched and landed the New Shepard launch vehicle 36 times with 1 partial failure deemed successful and 1 failure. The launch vehicle has a length of 19.2 meters (63 ft), a diameter of 3.8 meters (12 ft) and a launch mass of 35,000 kilograms (77,000 lb). The BE-3PM engine produces 490 kilonewtons (110,000 lbf) of thrust at liftoff.
On January 30, 2026, Blue Origin announced further New Shepard launches would be paused for at least two years to allow the company to shift resources to their Blue Moon series of landers in support of the Artemis Program.