India has spent decades building a reputation for doing ambitious space missions on relatively modest budgets. A new peer-reviewed study now challenges one part of that image.

Researchers from the University of Cambridge and Politecnico di Torino estimate that the India satellite launch cost reached $13,302 per kilogram to Low Earth Orbit in 2025—more than four times their comparable estimate of $3,225 per kg for the United States.

Among the six major launch markets highlighted in the paper, India comes out as the most expensive on this particular per-kilogram measure. But that headline needs an important qualifier. The $13,302 number is not an ISRO price list. It is a modelled, standardised estimate designed to compare launch economics across countries with very different rockets, payload capacities and launch frequencies. That distinction is now at the centre of a dispute over what India's space programme actually costs—and what “cheap” means in the launch business.

India Satellite Launch Cost: What the Study Actually Found

The paper, titled Geopolitics and space access: cost asymmetries and strategic dependence, was written by economists Alessio Terzi and Francesco Nicoli and published in Economics Letters.

Its associated dataset contains 6,740 rocket launches between 1960 and 2025, covering 16 geographical entities and more than six decades of launch activity. Cost information was assembled from public sources including government documents, academic work and other publicly available records, then standardised to a Low-Earth-Orbit-equivalent basis in 2024 US dollars. For 2025, the researchers estimated:

That makes the India vs US satellite launch cost gap about 4.1 times on the researchers' standardised measure. It is a striking number, particularly because India's space programme is routinely associated with frugal engineering. The researchers, however, say there is an economic reason for the apparent contradiction.

Why India's Satellite Launch Cost Per Kg Looks So High

The study does not argue that every Indian rocket is extraordinarily expensive to manufacture or launch in absolute terms. Instead, it points to payload size. Terzi and Nicoli say India's high per-kilogram figure is partly the result of concentrating on smaller launch vehicles. Fixed mission costs may be relatively low internationally, but when those expenses are spread across a smaller payload, the satellite launch cost per kg rises sharply.

Think of it as the difference between a small taxi and a full bus. The taxi may cost much less to operate in total. But if the question is how much it costs to move each passenger, a nearly full large vehicle can be far more economical. Launch cadence adds another layer. The researchers find that since 2010, only the United States and Europe show statistically significant national “experience curves”—meaning costs have fallen systematically as launch experience and cumulative payload have increased.

India's lower flight frequency gives its launch ecosystem fewer opportunities to spread fixed infrastructure costs, build production scale and learn through repeated operations.

India vs US Satellite Launch Cost Is Not Just About Reusable Rockets

SpaceX is an obvious part of the American advantage. Its Falcon 9 can carry far more payload to Low Earth Orbit than India's small launchers, and its first stage is routinely recovered and reused. But reusability alone does not explain the India vs US satellite launch cost gap. SpaceX also flies at extraordinary frequency.

Its missions serve commercial customers, NASA, the US military and other government clients, while SpaceX itself creates enormous internal demand by repeatedly launching Starlink satellites.

The Economics Letters study says the United States accounted for more than 80% of global payload mass placed into orbit in 2025. That volume matters. A reusable rocket that flies rarely still has major infrastructure and workforce costs. A reusable rocket that flies constantly can spread those costs across far more missions and payload. So America's advantage comes from a combination of scale, cadence, payload capacity, reuse and sustained demand.

Department of Space Pushes Back on the Comparison

Indian officials have challenged how the headline number should be interpreted. A highly placed Department of Space source told Times of India that the research did not sufficiently account for factors including launch subsidies, lower domestic logistics costs and savings associated with launching Indian spacecraft from Sriharikota.

The source also pointed to price-support schemes operated through the Department of Space and IN-SPACe. IN-SPACe's own material confirms that India has introduced price-support policies aimed at lowering barriers for non-government entities using launch services, facilities and other space infrastructure. However, that does not necessarily make the academic calculation wrong. There are two different questions here.

Economic cost: What does a standardised model estimate it costs a country to put a kilogram into orbit?

Customer price: What does a particular satellite operator actually pay after discounts, subsidies, rideshare arrangements and negotiated commercial terms?

Those numbers do not have to be identical. A subsidy can make a launch cheaper for the customer while somebody else—usually the government—absorbs part of the cost.

ISRO Has Not Formally Rejected the Study

This distinction is particularly important when describing the official reaction. As of August 24, the reporting reviewed does not show a detailed written rebuttal from ISRO or the Department of Space addressing the study's dataset line by line. Times of India quotes an unnamed senior Department of Space source disputing elements of the comparison. Mint reported separately that emails seeking comment from ISRO and its commercial arm, NewSpace India Ltd, had gone unanswered at the time of publication. So the safest formulation for India space news is that Department of Space sources have challenged the study, rather than saying ISRO has officially disproved or rejected it.

A formal methodology-based response could change that assessment if one is issued later.

Skyroot Shows Why Small Rockets Complicate the Comparison

India's emerging private launch industry illustrates the same point. Mint reported that Skyroot Aerospace chief executive Pawan Kumar Chandana had previously said Vikram-1 was expected to generate at least $4 million per launch. At the vehicle's stated peak LEO capacity of around 350 kg, that works out to at least roughly $11,000 per kg if calculated at full capacity using that revenue figure. That is still far above the US study average. But Vikram-1 and Falcon 9 are not designed to serve exactly the same market.

Vikram-1 is a small launcher intended to give smaller spacecraft more dedicated access to orbit. Falcon 9 is a heavy, high-cadence platform capable of spreading costs across far greater payload mass. Comparing their per-kilogram economics is useful—but it does not capture every reason a customer might select one over the other.

Does This Mean India's Famous Frugal Space Model Is a Myth?

No. The study measures launch transportation economics, not the total cost-effectiveness of India's space programme. ISRO's reputation for frugality was built partly on the comparatively low overall budgets of missions such as Mars Orbiter Mission and Chandrayaan missions. Mission cost includes spacecraft development, engineering labour, testing, ground systems, operations and many other expenses.

Rocket cost per kilogram answers a narrower question. In fact, the paper itself acknowledges the tension between India's frugal-space reputation and its estimated launch cost before explaining that small rocket size helps drive the result. Both things can therefore be true: India can execute some space missions at unusually low overall budgets, while simultaneously having a relatively high estimated cost for moving each kilogram into LEO.

What the Study Means for India's Commercial Launch Plans

This is where the findings become commercially significant. India wants private launch companies to grow, increase launch frequency and capture a larger share of the global space economy. IN-SPACe's decadal strategy targets India's space economy growing from about $8.4 billion in 2022 to $44 billion by 2033, or roughly 7–8% of the global market. Competitive launch economics will matter to that ambition.

But the study does not prove that every foreign operator will pay four times more to launch in India than in America. Commercial customers compare much more than a modelled national average. They consider available dates, desired orbit, rocket reliability, integration requirements, export restrictions, rideshare opportunities and whether they want a dedicated mission. The research is therefore better understood as a warning about structural economics than as a direct price comparison between two booking websites for rockets.

India's Biggest Challenge May Be Scale

The most useful conclusion from the research may not be that India's rockets are “too expensive.” It is that India needs more launches. Higher cadence can create a cycle: more flights support greater production volume, greater experience can reduce costs, lower costs attract more customers, and additional customers support still more flights. The United States has built that cycle around Falcon 9 and an enormous base of government, commercial and internally generated SpaceX demand. India has not yet reached comparable scale. Its newer private companies, industrialisation of the SSLV programme and future reusable-launch technologies could change that equation, but the 2025 study captures the system before those efforts have matured.

What the India Satellite Launch Cost Debate Actually Tells Us

The headline number is real. According to Terzi and Nicoli's model, the India satellite launch cost in 2025 was $13,302 per kilogram, compared with $3,225 in the US. Among the six major launch markets compared, India ranked highest. But three conclusions do not automatically follow. It does not mean ISRO charges every customer $13,302 per kilogram. It does not prove every Indian launch is less competitive than every American one. And it does not erase India's record of conducting some ambitious space missions at comparatively modest total budgets.

What it does expose is a scale problem. India's launchers fly less often, generally move less payload per flight than the dominant American system, and have not yet developed the same combination of reusable hardware and recurring demand. That makes this more than another argument over India space news. The real test will be whether India's expanding public and private launch ecosystem can turn its traditional strength—low absolute engineering costs—into the one advantage the new global launch economy increasingly rewards: low cost at scale.