Amazon's Starlink Rival Set to Double Its Rocket Launches

Amazon plans to double its launch frequency and cram more satellites into each rocket as the company races to catch up with SpaceX’s Starlink. Amazon's Leo is supposed to become more widely available later this year. But currently, the system spans just over 200 satellites—too few to kick off a robust satellite internet service. Instead, the company has been beta-testing Leo with select enterprise customers. Since it flew up its first Leo satellites in April 2025, Amazon has completed eight flights, with a ninth scheduled for Sunday. “The program is on pace to complete 11 launches in our first year of deployment,” the company said in a blog post. But for year two, Amazon says: “We’re on pace to more than double our annual launch rate to over 20 missions and send even more satellites to space at a time.” This includes using Blue Origin’s New Glenn and United Launch Alliance’s (ULA) Vulcan Centaur, two heavy-lift rockets that can carry even more Leo satellites into space.