payload

noun

pay·​load ˈpā-ˌlōd 

plural payloads

1

: the load carried by a vehicle exclusive of what is necessary for its operation

especially : the load carried by an aircraft or spacecraft consisting of people or things (such as passengers or instruments) necessary to the purpose of the flight

NASA's first post-Challenger launching is tentatively set for May 1. Its payload, the NOAA-G weather satellite, will be lofted by an expendable Scout rocket.

—J. Eberhart

Their objective was to size the airplane according to its intended payload.

—Clive Irving

2

: the weight of a payload

… the Bronco had a payload of 2000 pounds.

—Darryl Young

Maximum fuel load is 3,550 pounds, leaving a payload of just 360 pounds with full tanks.

—J. Mac McClellan

3

: the destructive component carried by a missile or bomb

… they did not fail to realize that a missile powerful enough to put a satellite into orbit could also deliver a nuclear payload to Washington, D.C., or New York, or Chicago, or any major American city.

—Alex Wellerstein

also : something likened to such a payload

American computer security experts were first to spot another worm whose virus payload was contained within an e-mail that masqueraded as a virus alert from Symantec.

—Pacific Business News

Thus, a potential pitfall for using adenoviruses as a vaccine delivery system is that a person's immune system may end up responding more to the adenovirus itself than the vaccine's genetic payload …

—Beth Mole

Synonyms

• burden
• cargo
• draft
• freight
• haul
• lading
• load
• loading
• weight

Examples of payload in a Sentence

The truck is carrying a payload of 2,580 pounds.

the space shuttle can carry a maximum payload of approximately 50,000 pounds

Recent Examples on the Web

And in a first, the Starship on Monday will attempt a Starlink payload deployment test – a key capability for the vehicle in the future. —Eric Lagatta, USA TODAY, 11 Jan. 2025

But according to Blue Origin, a larger nose cone gives New Glenn twice the cargo volume of Falcon 9, and its powerful engines are designed to propel double the payload mass. —Jeremy Bogaisky, Forbes, 11 Jan. 2025

Also flying were payloads for Astranis Space Technologies and Gravity Space headed for geostationary orbits. —Richard Tribou, Orlando Sentinel, 10 Jan. 2025

The ship's propellant tanks have 25 percent more volume than previous iterations of the vehicle, and the payload compartment, which contains 10 mock-ups of Starlink Internet satellites on this launch, is somewhat smaller. —Ars Technica, 9 Jan. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1914, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Kids Definition

payload

noun

pay·​load ˈpā-ˌlōd 

: something (as cargo, passengers, instruments, or explosives) carried by a vehicle in addition to what is necessary for its operation