The tree · Access · Happens to the world · Could be decided within 5 to 20 years
A seat to orbit is sold to a private person for under a million dollars
Private orbital seats cost tens of millions today. Under a million is the point where an orbital flight is a serious personal purchase rather than a billionaire's, and the A1 tier becomes reachable by saving rather than by fortune.
The test: what counts as it having happened
A commercial provider sells, by public price or a publicly reported contract, a seat on an orbital flight to a private individual for under one million 2026 dollars, and the flight takes place.
Settled by: The provider's public price or reported contract, and the flight record
The odds, by how long I live
| baselineto 2071 ± 8 | moderateto 2080 | strongto 2095 | radicalto 2136 | openno deadline |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 60% | 72% | 85% | 93% | 95% |
Each column is a different guess at how long I live, from current trends (baseline) to open-ended. The number is the chance this happens before that deadline, assuming everything it depends on happens first. As of September 19th, 2026.
Why these numbers: Launch cost is a small part of a seat's price; the rest is the vehicle, training and insurance, which fall with volume but slowly.
What this one is worth
Nothing. The headline number does not rest on this step at any remove, so however it turns out, the chance that I live and work off Earth does not change. That is not a judgement that it does not matter. It is what the tree says: this step feeds a tier above the one the headline asks about, or sits beside the equation rather than in it.
Think this estimate is wrong?
Here's how to tell me, and
what happens next.
The record itself is data/A-access.toml in the public repository.