This is a list of fictional spacecraft, starships and exo-atmospheric vessels that have been identified by name in notable published works of fiction. The term "spacecraft" is mainly used to refer to spacecraft that are real or conceived using present technology. The terms "spaceship" and "starship" are generally applied only to fictional space vehicles, usually those capable of transporting people.
Betty Boop – Intership shuttle used by the protagonists in Gemina, the second book in the Illuminae series, to prevent timeline collapse by returning the corpses of the respective timelines' protagonist to their own universe.
Pathfinder (OV-201) - NERVA powered second-generation Space Shuttle orbiter from season 2 of TV series For All Mankind, capable of cislunar flight with orbital refuelling
Aether – a large modular crewed spacecraft returning from a 2-year mission in the ongoing colonization of the fictional habitable Jovian moon X-13 in the 2020 movie The Midnight Sky
Bilkis – an experimental spaceship in the anime series Geneshaft[18][19]
Cepheus – a ship made for transport between different bases and colonies in the deep Solar System in the movie Ad Astra.
Democratic Circus – an interplanetary cruiser used for defensive and policing actions within the Epsilon Eridani system seen in the Revelation Space series.
Discovery One – a scientific research spacecraft sent to Jupiter in the novels: "2001: A Space Odyssey" and "2010: Odyssey Two" and the corresponding films: "2001: A Space Odyssey" (1968) and "2010: The Year We Make Contact" (1984).
Europa One – a scientific research spacecraft made to send astronauts to Jupiter's moon Europa to find extraterrestrial life under the moons surface in Europa Report.
Lander – a ship used as a way to transport the crew of Europa One to the surface of Europa. It contains mining and recording materials to search for alien life under the surface of the moon.
Excelsior – from the 1918 Danish film Himmelskibet (A Trip to Mars), "The film that marked the beginning of the space opera subgenre of science fiction." – Phil Hardy[20]
Iris Resupply Probe – Resupply probe, designed to give Mark Watney enough food to survive until Ares 4. The probe exploded during launch due to a rushed design and manufacturing stage.
MAV (Mars Ascent Vehicle) and MDV (Mars Descent Vehicle)landers – non-reusable landers used during the Ares missions
Hunter IV – personal fighter of Samus Aran from the Metroid series
Icarus I and Icarus II – spaceships from the 2007 movie Sunshine[22]
unnamed modular Mars cycler spacecraft tethered to launch vehicle Kingfisher to create artificial gravity for the fictional 2-year Mars mission MTS-42 in the 2021 movie Stowaway
Valley Forge – American Airlines space freighter, outfitted with geodesic dome greenhouses preserving the last forests in the 1972 film Silent Running[33]
Arcadia (アルカディア号) – the most powerful space battleship in the Captain Harlock universe, created by Tochiro Oyama as his final gift to his friend Harlock before his inevitable demise
LCAM-01XA Archangel – a state-of-the-art warship from the anime Mobile Suit Gundam SEED & SEED Destiny. The first of its class, which it also takes its name from Archangel. She has a nearly identical sister-ship known as the Dominion. Both ships are named after the Hierarchy of angels, and had there been a 3rd sister-ship, she would've most likely been called the Seraphim.
Argonaut – the most advanced starship of the Iron Tribe in the anime series Heroic Age[37]
Ark – a ship from Transformers.[38] The flagship of the Autobots commanded by Optimus Prime in several Transformers series.[39] The computer of the ship was called Teletraan I (voice provided by Casey Kasem), and it provided intelligence to the Autobots for their various missions.[40] The original series saw it crashing on Earth several million years prior to 1984, and it was discovered some three million years before then by the characters of Beast Wars: Transformers.
Aurora – Private starship owned by Alterra which had a mission of terraforming planets but was shot down when attempting a slingshot maneuver around planet 4546B. (From the Subnautica video game)
Athena – starship which transports humans to a space station orbiting the planet Solaris in the 2002 film Solaris
Avalon – the Homestead Company (also using Sony hardware) starliner in the film Passengers, which transports emigrates from the Earth to Homestead II
Axiom – the Buy n' Large starliner in the films WALL-E and BURN-E, which is used, together with other starships, to provide a temporary home for humanity,[41] but the originally planned 5-year cruise turns into a 700-year time period.
Blip-A – light propelled (indirectly) ship built and crewed by Eridians in Project Hail Mary. Blip-A is an exonym; the direct translation would be 'Ship'.
Conquistador – the largest battleship of the Henrietta Planetary Alliance (Starship Operators)[47]
Copernicus – independent explorer/hauler, the Copernicus helped rescue and transport evacuees of the Battle on Kerenza IV in the Illuminae Files. It was destroyed by Alexander's Artificial Intelligence Defense Analytics Network (A.I.D.A.N) when an outbreak of Phobos, a bioweapon engineered by Beitech Industries for urban pacification, rendered it a threat to the fleet.
Daban Urnud – interdimensional starship that visits the planet of Arbre in the Neil Stephenson novel Anathem
"The Derelict" – the name given to the abandoned alien spacecraft discovered by the crew of the deep space tug Nostromo in the film Alien (1979)[48]
Darksyde – The Predacon transwarp ship in the Beast Warstelevision series.[49] The name was spelled with a y in the Beast Wars video game and in the DVD box set. In IDW Publishing's 2008 Beast Wars Sourcebook it was spelled "Darkside". The ship's computer was voiced by Elizabeth Carol Savenkoff.[50]
Destiny Ascension – an Asari dreadnaught with a crew of 10,000 that serves as the flagship of the Citadel fleet in the Mass Effect universe[51][52]
Eltrium – Earth's flagship of its interstellar fleet originally created as an evacuation ship in case of extraterrestrial attacks in Gunbuster.
Endurance – NASA spacecraft/space station hybrid capable of traveling through wormholes, mothership to Rangers and Landers in Interstellar[54]
Lander – two cargo spacecraft used in the Endurance mission to transport materials from the Endurance to Mann's planet; Lander 1 is later used by TARS to propel the craft far enough from SMBH Gargantua.
Ranger – various SSTO spaceplanes featured in Interstellar: the Ranger Test Article, piloted by Cooper during his crash; the twelve Rangers used during the Lazarus missions to carry astronauts through the wormhole to twelve potentially habitable planets; Ranger 1 and Ranger 2 used to carry personnel from the Endurance to Miller's, Mann's and Edmunds's planets (Ranger 2 is later used by Cooper like TARS's Lander); the futuristic Rangers, used around Saturn as the Cooper station's auxiliary craft (one is later stolen by Cooper and TARS to rejoin with Amelia on Edmunds's planet).
Event Horizon – gravity drive exploration starship, aiming to explore Proxima Centauri, disappears on its maiden voyage and rediscovered seven years later with its crew missing, a space-borne "Mary Celeste"
Exelion – 12 kilometer long warship originally commissioned as Earth's flagship in Gunbuster.
Hypatia – Long range scientific exploration vessel used to escort evacuees from the Battle of Kerenza IV in the Illuminae Files.
Icarus – near-light speed ship with onboard cryogenic chambers used to land astronauts on habitable worlds thousands of light years away to ensure the survival of the human race in Planet Of The Apes
Island Cluster Class Colonization Ship 25 (Macross Frontier) – Colony Fleet consisting on a transformable fighting ship, the main population vessel and other smaller islands from the anime Macross Frontier[57]
Karrajor – a warship from the Cartoon Network series Megas XLR. It serves as a mothership for the squid-like alien race known as the Glorft.
R.L.S. Legacy – a space exploration vessel from the Disney animated film Treasure Planet. It is a space ship that is designed to emulate a Sailing ship from the 1600s.
Leonora Christine – colonization starship utilizing the fictional Bussard ramjet drive in the novel Tau Zero to create enough speed for onboard time dilation to occur so the passengers can reach the far away Beta Virginis star within their lifetime.
Nirvana – a supership from the anime series Vandread[66]
Normandy SR-1 – a Systems Alliance Navy frigate that serves as Commander Shepard's base of operations in the Mass Effect universe. Sequels feature a larger and more advanced version known as the SR-2.[67][68]
USG Ishimura – A planet-cracking mining vessel and the main setting of the first game of Dead Space. It is also referred to as the 'beginning of the Necromorph's takeover'.
USS Cerritos – the primary ship in Star Trek: Lower Decks; see Starfleet ships for more information.
USS Discovery – the primary ship in Star Trek: Discovery, which travels instantaneously through space using a mycelial network; see Starfleet ships for more information.
USS Enterprise – various incarnations of a space exploration vessel from Star Trek; see Starfleet ships for more information[83][84]
USS Orville – The titular vessel from the 2017–present TV series The Orville.
USS Protostar – the primary ship in Star Trek: Prodigy, which utilizes a protostar to travel considerably faster than conventional warp speed; see Starfleet ships for more information.
Known as The Argo in the American localized version.
Yggdrasil – starship owned by the Templars and used for the transportation of the nine Pilgrims to the planet Hyperion in the 1990 Dan Simmons Novel Hyperion
Space fighters
"Space fighters" are fictional spacecraft analogous to fighter aircraft. They are popular as the subjects of flight simulators, movies and books. The following are some examples of notable space fighters from various media franchises:
In the Star Wars universe, a "starfighter" is a blanket term for all small combat space craft, regardless of shields, hyperspace capability, weaponry (unless it carries none), armor, maneuverability and crew. "Snubfighter" (a term first used in Star Wars), though no concise definition has been given, often refers to a fighter carrying shielding, secondary weapons systems such as proton torpedoes or concussion missiles, and being hyperspace capable. Starfighters sometimes bear mission designations similar to modern fighter aircraft, such as "strike fighter" and "space superiority fighter".
Sanctuary II, the ship of Thanos in Thor: Ragnarok, Avengers: Infinity War, and Avengers: Endgame
Statesman, the ship carrying surviving Asgardians to Earth in Thor: Ragnarok
Transportation
Arcadia Class Jumpship (Destiny 2) The Arcadia Class Jumpship is the first ship the player gets access to and allows them to fly to other planets in the solar system
Nostromo – modified Lockmart CM-88B Bison Transport; commercial towing vessel from the film Alien[137]
Out of Band II (Oobii) – a freighter from the Zones of Thought series by Vernor Vinge, the main ship used by a multi-species crew to travel to a planet near the center of the galaxy
Narcissus – modified Lockmart Starcub Light Intrasystem Shuttle; shuttlecraft for the Weyland-Yutani commercial hauler USCSS Nostromo in the film Alien[149]
Phoenix – first Earth spacecraft to achieve faster-than-light speed using warp drive; spaceship that instigated Earth's first contact with aliens in Star Trek: First Contact.
S.T.E.V. – short for "Shuttle Transport Emergency Vessel", a single-person spacecraft featured in the video game Void Bastards.
SS Emporium – Taybor the Trader's spacecraft, featured in the Year Two Space: 1999 episode "The Taybor". The spaceship Emporium, inspired to the Mars Excursion Module, is equipped with a special Jump Drive engine, which allows it to travel between two points via teleportation in hyperspace.
TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimension In Space) – various spacecraft-time machine hybrids equipped with some sort of jump drive featured on the television series Doctor Who.[150] Many TARDIS versions are featured, the Doctor's one (a Type 40 TT Capsule) externally resembles a British police box.
^The Transformers Beast Wars Sourcebook by Don Figueroa, Simon Furman, Ben Yee, Dan M. Khanna, Guido Guidi, Jake Isenberg, Marcelo Matere, Nick Roche, Rob Ruffolo and Simon Williams
^Encyclopedia of television shows, 1925 through 2007 by Vincent Terrace
