Elon Musk says when SpaceX will achieve the breakthrough for life to become multiplanetary

SpaceX's quest to achieve full reusability of Starship is expected to come to a close next year, according to company CEO Elon Musk.

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Musk recently appeared on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast, where he explained SpaceX's goals with rocket development and how the company is aiming to first achieve full reusability and then rapid reusability. Musk explains that the Falcon 9 rocket, while technically reusable due to its booster being able to land, SpaceX still loses the upper stage, which costs $10 million and a few days of time to build before another launch can take place. The goal is to achieve full rapid reusability of both the upper and lower stage, the booster, and the ship (cargo part of the rocket).

It should be noted that full rapid reusability can be compared to an aircraft, which can take off and land without any damage at all. Full reusability would be defined as both the upper and lower stages of the rocket landing but sustaining some damage that requires repair time.

Musk says Starship has been designed with full rapid reusability in mind and that a milestone in the quest to full rapid reusability will be reached during 2025. The SpaceX CEO says Starship's upper stage, otherwise known as the Ship part of the rocket, will become reusable sometime in 2025. Musk says SpaceX is already quite close to rapid reusability with Starship's booster, which is currently being landed back on the Mechazilla launch tower and caught by the two chopstick arms. However, the booster is still enduring some damage upon reentry into Earth's atmosphere, requiring repairs from SpaceX engineers before it can be launched again.

Despite these small tweaks that are required, Musk says SpaceX is "close" to achieving full rapid reusability of the booster. As for the Ship, Musk says that he believes SpaceX will be able to achieve reusability in 2025 and then full rapid reusability of both the booster and Ship next year.

The SpaceX CEO explains that full, rapid reusability of a rocket will dramatically reduce how much money it costs to get mass to orbit and dramatically reduce the cost of putting mass on the surface of Mars. Achieving these technological breakthroughs is necessary for SpaceX's overarching quest to make humans a multi-planetary species, as once Starship is capable of full rapid reusability, humans will be journeying to the Red Planet to begin the colonization process.