Rocket DB

Head to head

Electron vs Kuaizhou 1A

Two vehicles in the same payload class. Every figure below comes from the same two sources for both rockets, and a row appears only when both publish the input.

Payload to low Earth orbit

Relative

Electron: 300 kg

Kuaizhou 1A: 300 kg

Side by side

8 comparable figures

The highlighted value wins the row. Rows where neither direction is better, like length or stage count, highlight nothing.

MetricElectronKuaizhou 1A
Flights flown9731
Success rate95.9%90.3%
Payload to LEO (kg)300300
Payload to SSO (kg)225250
Length (m)1819.4
Diameter (m)1.21.4
Launch mass (t)1330
Stages34

Electron

Flight record
95.9% success rate93 of 97 flown · 4 failed
2017peak 2026 · 30 flights2026

Maiden flight 2017-05-25. Still flying.

Kuaizhou 1A

Flight record
90.3% success rate28 of 31 flown · 3 failed
2017peak 2023 · 6 flights2025

Maiden flight 2017-01-09. Still flying.

Electron is built by Rocket Lab of the United States (company profile on Space Index).Kuaizhou 1A is built by ExPace of China (company profile on Space Index).

Full specifications and the complete launch history for each: Electron · Kuaizhou 1A.

Specifications from Launch Library 2 by The Space Devs, launch records from Space Index. Derived figures are computed here; see sources and method.