--- title: "Blue Origin Says Its Next Engine Will Push Harder Than the BE-4 for a Quarter of the Cost" description: "Northstar will replace New Glenn’s first-stage engines, and a hydrogen third stage aims at GEO and the Moon. The target: 1,000+ launches a year" author: "Nate Ledger" published: 2026-11-06T00:17:06Z modified: 2026-11-06T15:48:58Z url: https://rews.cc/a/blue-origin-says-its-next-engine-will-push-harder-than-the-b-593ae2 language: en tags: ["blue-origin", "new-glenn", "rocket", "be-4", "northstar", "tech"] publisher: "Rews (https://rews.cc)" --- # Blue Origin Says Its Next Engine Will Push Harder Than the BE-4 for a Quarter of the Cost *Northstar will replace New Glenn’s first-stage engines, and a hydrogen third stage aims at GEO and the Moon. The target: 1,000+ launches a year* By Nate Ledger · November 6, 2026 · https://rews.cc/a/blue-origin-says-its-next-engine-will-push-harder-than-the-b-593ae2 ## In brief - Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp announced two New Glenn upgrades at the UP.Summit conference at Kennedy Space Center - The company aims to eventually position New Glenn to launch more than 1,000 times a year - The Northstar engine has half the parts and 30% less mass than the BE-4, and starts at 715,000 lbs of thrust versus 640,000 - Blue Origin expects Northstar to cost 25% as much as a BE-4 to build and has begun test firings - A hydrogen-oxygen GS3 third stage is targeting a 2028 debut, and BE-4 production will continue for ULA’s Vulcan Last month Blue Origin said it [wanted to launch 100 times a year from Florida](https://rews.cc/a/blue-origin-plans-100-florida-launches-a-year-for-a-rocket-t-4441ba), with a rocket that had flown twice at that point. On Thursday it added a zero. Speaking at the UP.Summit conference, held at the Shuttle Landing Facility at Kennedy Space Center, chief executive Dave Limp announced two upgrades to the New Glenn rocket. [As Eric Berger reported for Ars Technica](https://arstechnica.com/space/2026/11/blue-origin-announces-rocket-upgrades-aimed-at-lower-costs-more-performance/), the company’s goal is to put New Glenn in a position to eventually fly more than 1,000 times a year. The first upgrade is a new engine, Northstar, which will eventually replace the BE-4 on New Glenn’s first stage. The second is GS3, a third stage that burns hydrogen and oxygen and is meant to push heavy payloads to geostationary orbit and the Moon. Limp’s case for all this was short: “There has never been higher demand for launch, ever.” ## The engine Limp described Northstar as a simpler version of the BE-4 that is also more powerful. It has half as many parts and 30 percent less mass, and about 65 percent of it can be 3D-printed. It works the same way as the BE-4: methane and liquid oxygen, an oxygen-rich staged combustion cycle and a single-shaft turbopump. So this is not a new kind of engine. It is the same engine with a lot of the complexity taken out. The BE-4 produces 640,000 pounds of thrust. Northstar will start at 715,000, which is about 12 percent more. “Start” is the kind of word engine companies use when they plan to go higher. ![A stylized rocket engine blasts orange and yellow flames against a blue background, with pipes, gears, flanges, and other mechanical parts floating nearby.](https://rews.cc/img/a4521b6d07a00d2079d47e3805b8109894b42336.webp) Then there is the cost. Blue Origin thinks it can build Northstar for 25 percent of what a BE-4 costs, and it wants to get to a point where an engine can be assembled in less than a day. Put another way, four Northstars for the price of one BE-4, each pushing harder. New Glenn’s first stage, in its current 7×2 configuration, carries seven engines. Seven BE-4s give you 4.48 million pounds of thrust. Seven Northstars would give you 5.005 million, or roughly an extra half-million pounds from the same number of engines, while the engine bill falls to a quarter. This is still a plan, though the company has already started test-firing the engine. There is an obvious objection. New Glenn’s booster is meant to be reused, and when you reuse hardware, the cost of building it gets spread over many flights, so manufacturing cost should matter less. That’s true if you fly a few times a year. It stops being true at a thousand. Here is a hypothetical, with a number I picked for easy arithmetic and that Blue Origin has not given: imagine every booster flew 25 times a year. Getting to 1,000 launches would still take a fleet of 40 boosters, which is 280 first-stage engines, and that’s before anything wears out. When a plan needs hundreds of engines, a cheaper engine you can build in a day stops being a nice extra. It’s the whole business model. ![An orange rolling pin with dark handles rolls over cream dough with rocket-shaped cutouts on a yellow surface scattered with cream rocket shapes.](https://rews.cc/img/0c87f2e9e4fddb196349520601fc078be07c4752.webp) “To get access to space at a lower cost, we have to look at every part of the vehicle,” Limp said. “This is going to be a game-changer.” Translated: the engine is still on the test stand, and the chief executive is very confident about it. ## The third stage GS3 is meant to give New Glenn an extra kick. According to [Blue Origin’s announcement](https://www.blueorigin.com/news/new-glenn-expands-reach-with-gs3), it runs on a single BE-7, the engine the company originally built for its Blue Moon lunar landers. It also fits inside the interstage, so the payload fairing loses no room. The company says the 7×2 New Glenn with GS3 will carry 8 metric tons directly to geostationary orbit and 10 tons to trans-lunar injection. The bigger 9×4 version would carry 14 and 20 tons. Blue Origin is aiming for a 2028 debut and says one government customer has already signed up for a cislunar mission. ![A stylized satellite with golden solar panels follows a curved golden trail from a dark planet toward a cream crescent moon against a teal background.](https://rews.cc/img/2b185941d0ac0b62821a264ea95faccf3b460808.webp) “Direct to GEO” is the selling point. Normally a rocket drops a geostationary satellite in a lower, stretched-out transfer orbit, and the satellite burns its own fuel to climb the rest of the way. Fuel spent climbing is fuel the satellite can’t use later to stay on station. If a third stage does that last climb, the customer gets to keep that fuel, and launch companies like selling customers something they would otherwise have to provide themselves. ## The other customer One more detail. Limp said Blue Origin will keep building the BE-4 for United Launch Alliance, whose Vulcan rocket uses two of them. So ULA, which buys engines from Blue Origin and also competes with it for launches, will go on paying for the old engine. Meanwhile Blue Origin moves its own rocket to a replacement that, by Blue Origin’s account, is more powerful and costs a quarter as much to make. There is nothing strange about that. Suppliers keep selling older products all the time, and ULA designed Vulcan around the BE-4. Still, I’d like to be in the room for the next BE-4 price negotiation, when ULA’s buyers bring up the press release. Limp says demand for launch has never been higher. Blue Origin’s plan for supply is mostly to 3D-print it.