Head to head

Long March 4B vs PSLV

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

Long March 4B: 4,200 kg

PSLV: 3,800 kg

Side by side

9 comparable figures

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

Metric	Long March 4B	PSLV
Flights flown	58	30
Success rate	98.3%	93.3%
Payload to LEO (kg)	4,200	3,800
Payload to GTO (kg)	1,500	1,200
Liftoff thrust (kN)	2,961	4,847
Length (m)	44.1	44
Diameter (m)	3.35	2.8
Launch mass (t)	249	230
Stages	3	4

Long March 4B

Flight record

98.3% success rate57 of 58 flown · 1 failed

1999peak 2020 · 5 flights2026

Maiden flight 1999-05-10. Still flying.

PSLV

Flight record

93.3% success rate28 of 30 flown · 2 failed

1993peak 2007 · 2 flights2024

Maiden flight 2007-04-23. Still flying.

Long March 4B is built by China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation of China.PSLV is built by Indian Space Research Organization of India (company profile on Space Index).

Full specifications and the complete launch history for each: Long March 4B · PSLV.

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