Launch Library 2 API
Overview
Launch Library 2 is a free, comprehensive API for spaceflight launches, rockets, missions, and events maintained by The Space Devs community. You can retrieve upcoming and historical launch data including launch vehicles, launch sites, agencies, and astronaut crews. It is one of the best space APIs for beginners because it requires no authentication and has excellent documentation.
Beginner Tip
Start by querying the upcoming launches endpoint to get a list of the next rocket launches with all mission details. The API supports filtering, ordering, and pagination through URL query parameters.
Measurement Record
What actually happened when we called this API from our own infrastructure. Every value below was recorded by the request, not copied from the provider's documentation.
- Request
- GET https://ll.thespacedevs.com/2.2.0/launch/upcoming/?limit=5&format=json
- Result
- HTTP 200 · application/json · 22,733 bytes · compressed
- Response time
- 204 ms (median of 3) · fastest 198 ms
- Transport
- TLSv1.3 · TLS_AES_256_GCM_SHA384 · certificate issued by Google Trust Services
- Browser CORS
- Allowed — Access-Control-Allow-Origin: *
- Served by
- cloudflare
- Recorded
- 2026-08-10
Fields Returned
Top-level fields present in the response we captured, with the type and value we actually received.
| Field | Type | Value received |
|---|---|---|
| count | integer | 364 |
| next | string (url) | https://ll.thespacedevs.com/2.2.0/launch/upco… |
| previous | null | null |
| results | array | [1 item] |
Captured Response
Captured from a real request to https://ll.thespacedevs.com/2.2.0/launch/upcoming/?limit=5&format=json on 2026-08-10. Long arrays and nested objects are truncated to keep the shape readable.
{
"count": 364,
"next": "https://ll.thespacedevs.com/2.2.0/launch/upcoming/?format=json&limit=5&offset=5",
"previous": null,
"results": [
{
"id": "cff704ab-8098-4f65-899e-50adaf908e59",
"url": "https://ll.thespacedevs.com/2.2.0/launch/cff704ab-8098-4f65-899e-50adaf908e59/?format=json",
"slug": "long-march-7a-chinasat-4b",
"name": "Long March 7A | ChinaSat 4B",
"status": {
"…": "(4 more fields)"
},
"last_updated": "2026-08-10T16:26:32Z",
"net": "2026-08-10T12:02:00Z",
"window_end": "2026-08-10T13:12:00Z",
"window_start": "2026-08-10T11:54:00Z",
"net_precision": {
"…": "(4 more fields)"
},
"probability": null,
"weather_concerns": null,
"holdreason": "",
"failreason": "Launch vehicle disintegrated when passing around Max-Q.",
"…": "(18 more fields)"
}
]
} Field Reference
id Unique UUID identifier for the launch record. name Name of the launch mission. net No Earlier Than (NET) launch time in ISO 8601 UTC format. Implementation Example
Calls a real endpoint of this API. Replace any placeholder credentials with your own key.
const url = "https://ll.thespacedevs.com/2.2.0/launch/upcoming/?limit=5&format=json";
const response = await fetch(url);
if (!response.ok) throw new Error(`Request failed: ${response.status}`);
const data = await response.json();
console.log(data); What Can You Build?
Note: These code examples are AI-generated and unverified. Always refer to the official API documentation for accurate usage.
How This API Fails
We deliberately sent this API a broken request and recorded exactly what came back on 2026-08-10. Knowing the shape of an error before you hit it makes error handling much easier to write.
Returned an HTML error page rather than JSON — worth knowing if your client assumes every response can be parsed as JSON.
Common Errors & Troubleshooting
Generated guidance based on this API's documentation, not observed by us. Treat it as a starting point and check against the provider's own error reference.
Measured Score Breakdown
Live HTTP request to the API endpoint
Fully tested on Aug 10, 2026
Technical Specifications
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