From coding at 12 to conquering space: Elon Musk’s 55 biggest milestones at 55

On June 28, Elon Musk turned 55 — entrepreneur, engineer, trillionaire, rocket innovator and AI pioneer. He recently became the world's first trillionaire after SpaceX went public, caught a rocket booster mid-air, and put a chip into someone's brain.

At age 12, Musk wrote code for a video game called Blastar and sold it to a magazine for $500. At 19, he was building and selling PCs out of his college dorm — entrepreneurship before he could legally drink. (Credit: X/@mayemusk)

At 24, Musk co-founded Zip2 with brother Kimbal, selling it for $307 million. At 27, he founded X.com, an online payments startup that later became PayPal — the company that would change his life forever.

At 30, PayPal went public and was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion, netting Musk $165 million. That same year, he founded SpaceX. At 32, he co-founded Tesla Motors; at 35, SolarCity followed.

At 35, the Tesla Roadster shipped. At 37, Falcon 1 became the first privately developed liquid-fuelled rocket to reach orbit. At 38, Falcon 9 completed its maiden flight — SpaceX was no longer a dream.

At 39, Tesla went public in one of 2010's most-watched IPOs, and Dragon flew to orbit. At 40, it became the first commercial spacecraft to reach the ISS — a historic first for private spaceflight.

At 41, Tesla opened its first Supercharger stations. At 43, Musk unveiled the Powerwall, launched Autopilot, and shipped the falcon-wing-door Model X — solving range anxiety and redefining EVs in one stretch.

At 44, Tesla launched the affordable Model 3. At 45, SpaceX reflew a used Falcon 9, Musk opened Tesla's first Gigafactory, founded Neuralink, started The Boring Company, and unveiled the Solar Roof — all in a single year.

At 46, Falcon Heavy launched as the most powerful operational rocket, carrying a Tesla Roadster. At 47, Starlink began. At 48, Musk sent NASA astronauts to orbit, unveiled Cybertruck, and shipped the Model Y.

At 49, Musk won NASA's Artemis contract to land humans on the Moon. At 50, his company flew the first all-civilian crew to orbit, and Musk unveiled Optimus, Tesla's humanoid robot.

At 51, Musk bought Twitter for $44 billion. At 52, he rebranded it to X, founded xAI, and launched Grok. At 53, SpaceX caught a Super Heavy booster mid-air. At 54, xAI acquired X and SpaceX went public — making Musk the world's first trillionaire.

As Musk turns 55 this year, it will be exciting to see what he does next.