This video ain&#x27;t bad, but it skims over the two most important points and skips one completely:<p>- SpaceX rocket goes really fast horizontally; it has to flip around and boost back, and then correct from horizontal to vertical orientation.<p>- Falcon 9 is an actual space launch system; it has different (i.e. much stricter) engineering constraints than a suborbital rocket. In particular, this affects the engine design.<p>- Most importantly, the first stage of Falcon 9 does what&#x27;s known as &quot;suicide burn&quot; - it waits until the last possible second to fire back the engine, so that it reaches exactly zero velocity relative to the ground as it touches down. It does so, because it can&#x27;t hover - even the single one one of the nine Merlin engines, throttled down to minimum, still generates more thrust than the now almost empty booster weights. On the other hand, Blue Origin&#x27;s rocket can slow down to a hover, and then take its time to stabilize and land.