India’s Heaviest Satellite CMS-03 to Lift Off Today — ISRO Prepares for Major Space Milestone

Sriharikota: The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) is all set to launch the Indian Navy’s GSAT 7R (CMS-03) communication satellite on Sunday evening at 5:26 PM today from the second launch pad of Satish Dhawan Space Station in Andhra Pradesh's Sriharikota.

This indigenously developed satellite will be the heaviest communication satellite that India has ever had, with a weight of about 4,400 kg.  The launch will be live streamed on ISRO's official YouTube channel at 5:26 this evening.

Live launch info from ISRO

Launch Day for #LVM3M5. India’s heavy-lift rocket launches #CMS03 today at 17:26 IST.

Youtube URL: https://t.co/gFKB0A1GJE
🗓️ 2 Nov 2025 (Sunday)
🕔 4:56 PM IST onwards

For more Information Visithttps://t.co/yfpU5OTEc5 pic.twitter.com/NB46ZT1Pwb

— ISRO (@isro) November 2, 2025

How will it help the Indian Navy?

It will make the Navy’s communication from space stronger and help it keep better track of the maritime domain awareness capabilities with the indigenous state-of-the-art components. The satellite uses many indigenous state-of-the-art components to fit exactly what the Indian Navy needs for its work, the Indian Navy said. “This satellite is India’s heaviest communication satellite so far, with a weight of more than 4,400 kg. It has many advanced parts made in India to meet the Indian Navy’s needs,” the Indian Navy stated.

What areas will it cover? 

CMS-03 is a satellite that sends signals in many bands. It will cover a large sea area and also the land of India, as per India's national space agency ISRO.

Which rocket will launch it?

The well-known LVM3 rocket will take it up. This same rocket helped India land on the Moon’s South Pole with the Chandrayaan-3 trip. This will be its fifth working flight. “CMS-03, at about 4,400 kg, will be the heaviest communication satellite sent to Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO) from India. The last flight of LVM3 carried the Chandrayaan-3 mission, which made India the first nation to land near the Moon’s south pole,” ISRO said in its note.

The rocket was put together before and has stayed on the pad since October 26 for checks before launch. The LVM3-M5 flight will follow 8 steps. The CMS-03 will leave the rocket at a height of about 179 km, moving at around 10 km per second. The rocket stands 43.5 metres tall and weighs 642 tonnes at lift-off. It has three stages of fuel to push the satellite to the geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO).