Head to head

Space Shuttle vs Titan IIIC

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

Space Shuttle: 27,500 kg

Titan IIIC: 13,100 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.

Metric	Space Shuttle	Titan IIIC
Flights flown	135	36
Success rate	98.5%	94.4%
Payload to LEO (kg)	27,500	13,100
Liftoff thrust (kN)	28,200	10,586
Length (m)	56.1	42
Diameter (m)	8	3
Launch mass (t)	2030	626
Stages	2	3

Space Shuttle

Flight record

98.5% success rate133 of 135 flown · 2 failed

1981peak 1985 · 9 flights2011

Maiden flight 1981-04-12. Retired.

Titan IIIC

Flight record

94.4% success rate34 of 36 flown · 2 failed

1965peak 1965 · 3 flights1982

Maiden flight 1965-06-18. Retired.

Space Shuttle is built by National Aeronautics and Space Administration of the United States (company profile on Space Index).Titan IIIC is built by Lockheed Martin of the United States.

Full specifications and the complete launch history for each: Space Shuttle · Titan IIIC.

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