One company's fleet, counted as a country's
The United States owns 13,118 active satellites, 76.7% of the 17,101 in orbit as of October 17, 2026. It's the largest national fleet by a wide margin, and the margin has a single cause: 11,137 of the American satellites, 85%, belong to Starlink, which is one company's network. Take them out and the United States still leads with 1,981, but its lead over China's 1,467 shrinks from about 9 to 1 to about 1.4 to 1.
That makes the headline number a story about one business rather than about a national space program. The 12,031 satellites that GCAT files under communications, 92% of the American fleet, are mostly that same network seen from another angle. GCAT's author notes that marking a satellite as active is sometimes a judgment call, so treat every count here as a careful estimate and not an audited list.
What they do
Communications accounts for 12,031 of the United States's active satellites (92%).
Where they orbit
Who operates them
The largest operators, and the largest families of satellites, owned by the United States. US military satellites carry the name USA followed by a number.
By operator
By satellite family
Operator names are as written in GCAT, usually transliterated from the original language. Families group satellites by the first word of their name.
How the fleet has grown
At the end of 2005, the United States had 1,039 payloads in Earth orbit. By the end of 2025 it had 11,798.
Launches
The United States has made 2,483 orbital launch attempts since its first in 1957, and 181 of them in 2025. Its busiest year was 2025 with 181.
The Russian fleet is the other long-running space power.
Where the American fleet began
The first American satellite, Explorer 1, was launched on February 1, 1958 UTC, which was the evening of January 31 in Florida, on a Juno I rocket from Launch Complex 26A at Cape Canaveral. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory built it and the US Army launched it, because NASA didn't exist yet. The agency was created that October. Explorer 1 became the first spacecraft to detect the Van Allen radiation belts.
American rockets have made 2,483 orbital launch attempts in GCAT's log since then, and the busiest year was 2025 with 181. SpaceX flew 170 of those 181. Two coastlines account for most of the flights: see launches from Florida and launches from Vandenberg.
The fleet beyond Starlink
Amazon's network, which GCAT lists as Kuiper, has 392 active satellites and is still being launched. The Kuiper page tells that story. Planet's imaging fleet is listed under the family name Flock and counts 118. Planet, based in San Francisco, was founded in 2010 as Cosmogia by former NASA scientists Chris Boshuizen, Will Marshall and Robbie Schingler, and its Doves are small 3U CubeSats grouped into named flocks. Its stated goal is to image the entire Earth every day.
The family called USA is the next big block, with 451 satellites. US military satellites carry the name USA followed by a number, which tells an outsider almost nothing about what each one does. GCAT lists the National Reconnaissance Office as operator of 290 active satellites. The NRO designs, builds, launches and operates US intelligence satellites, and its existence stayed secret until it was declassified on September 18, 1992. Two more government operators, listed as USSF SSC and SDA, account for 132 and 111.
Outside communications, Earth imaging is the biggest category with 495 satellites, then technology demonstrations with 163, signals intelligence with 51 and navigation with 45.
What a national count leaves out
GCAT counts a satellite for the country of its owner. Where it was built and which rocket flew it don't matter, so a foreign-built satellite operated by an American firm counts here, and an American satellite launched from abroad does too. That's a fair way to ask who runs the sky, and a poor way to ask who builds the hardware.
Launch credit follows ownership closely: 12,879 of its 13,118 active satellites flew on American rockets, 161 on rockets credited to France, 40 on Electron rockets credited to New Zealand and 35 on Russian rockets. Orbit matters as well. 12,342 of the 13,118, 94%, fly in the lowest band, below 600 km. SpaceX has said failed Starlink satellites are expected to deorbit within five years without propulsion. SpaceX announced in January 2026 a plan to lower about 4,400 satellites from 550 km to 480 km. What reaches orbit and what stays there are different questions, and the space debris page covers the second.
For comparison, the second largest fleet is China's, and it has a very different mix.