The first commercial spacecraft to deliver cargo to the International Space Station and currently the only cargo spacecraft flying capable of returning significant amounts of cargo to Earth. The free-flying reusable spacecraft has a 6 000 kg total payload mass and a 25 cubic centimetre volume. It is designed to deliver both cargo and people into orbit. During its maiden flight in December 2010, Dragon became the first commercially built and operated spacecraft to be recovered successfully from orbit. Dragon also made history on 25 May 2012, when it became the first commercial spacecraft in history to deliver cargo to the ISS and safely return cargo to Earth—a feat previously achieved only by governments. In April 2018, Dragon made its 14th successful ISS resupply mission.

Dragon was also designed from the beginning to carry up to seven passengers to and from Earth orbit (Crew Dragon, or Dragon 2). The first demonstration flight under NASA's Commercial Crew Program launched on 2 March 2019, and Dragon successfully docked with the ISS the following day, becoming the first American spacecraft in history to autonomously dock with the station.

In its first unpiloted demonstration flight, dubbed Demo-1, SpaceX launched on 2 March 2019 a Falcon 9 booster with the first Crew Dragon spacecraft from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Crew Dragon docked without incident with the ISS’s Harmony module, where ISS crew members entered the craft to begin transferring cargo. This marked the first time SpaceX has ever docked with ISS under its own guidance and propulsion systems. The six-day mission ended on 8 April with a successful undocking and splashdown in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Florida.

On 30 May 2020, Crew Dragon carried NASA astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken safely to the ISS, making it the first private spacecraft to take humans to the space station; the mission also returned America’s ability to fly NASA astronauts to and from the International Space Station on American vehicles for the first time since 2011.

SpaceX added another milestone on 15 November 2020, when Crew Dragon launched from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida aboard a Falcon 9 rocket on its first fully operational mission to the ISS. The four astronauts — NASA’s Mike Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Soichi Noguchi — arrived safely at the ISS on 16 November, when they started their six-month science mission as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program.

Sparkling aurora colours of magenta and green colour the skies while the International Space Station orbits above the planet every 90 minutes on 13 August 2016. Space X's Dragon resupply vehicle is seen docked to the Earth-facing port of the Harmony module.

Credit: NASA