Chinese maglev is like a rocket on rails, which also decelerates with stunning efficiency
YT/CTGN
China’s maglev research program has logged a new speed milestone, launching a 1.1-tonne test vehicle to 650 km/h (about 404 mph) in only seven seconds and within 600 m of track.
The run, conducted on the 1-km demonstration line at Donghu Laboratory in Hubei Province, showcases a short-distance “sprint” approach that relies on electromagnetic propulsion rather than the long test tracks, often 30 km or more, used elsewhere.
Engineers achieved the breakthrough by pairing a high-power linear motor with magnetic levitation “like-pole repulsion” that keeps the vehicle floating fractionally above the guideway. Eliminating wheel-rail contact means the prototype battles only aerodynamic drag, enabling extreme acceleration and, just as importantly, tightly controlled braking.
State broadcaster CTGN reports that the train can stop from top speed in 200 m, thanks to the same high-resolution control system that tracks position to within four millimetres.
Li Weichao, director of the High-speed Maglev Electromagnetic Propulsion Technology Innovation Center at the lab, said the sprint test is “the fastest speed in the world,” reached over such a short distance.
The same CTGN report mentions that the current record is not the target ceiling, and the line has been engineered for routine trials at 800 km/h once construction and commissioning wrap up later this year.
Bending the test-track rule book
Traditional high-speed validation programs require lengthy straightaways to give prototypes room to accelerate, cruise, and brake. Donghu’s team flipped that model, betting on millimetric sensing, variable-frequency drive electronics, and a purpose-built aerodynamic shroud over the guideway to squeeze an entire high-speed profile into one kilometre or 0.6 miles.
The tighter footprint means more daily tests, lower land-acquisition costs, and easier integration with urban research parks. It also offers a springboard for work on power-electronics cooling, fault-tolerant levitation coils, and low-drag carriage shapes.
A broader Chinese maglev push
China already operates more commercial maglev route-kilometres than any other country, edging out South Korea and Japan. The Shanghai Maglev, built around Germany’s Transrapid technology and opened in 2004, still carries passengers at 430 km/h. Germany’s Transrapid program, despite decades of R&D, never found a home market, leaving China to iterate and deploy.
Recent Chinese experiments reach well beyond airport shuttles. In 2022, researchers rolled out a high-temperature superconducting (HTS) prototype designed for 600 km/h cruise speeds, while 2024 trials of a full-scale ultra-high-speed (UHS) low-vacuum tube concept hinted at 1,000 km/h potential.
Parallel work on in-train 5G coverage aims to keep passengers streaming video, even through long tunnels, at those velocities.
Ambitions are not limited to earthbound transport. Private, Chinese space firm Galactic Energy is developing a maglev launch assist system that could fling small satellite stages skyward before rocket ignition, targeting operational status around 2028.
Outside East Asia, maglev’s footprint remains modest. South Korea fields a low-to-medium-speed line between Incheon Airport and Yongyu, while Japan’s superconducting Chūō Shinkansen is still under construction.
The United States has investigated routes linking Washington D.C. to Baltimore and Las Vegas to Southern California, but no revenue-service project has broken ground.
What the new acceleration milestone means
By demonstrating controlled 650 km/h sprints on a one-kilometre track, Donghu Laboratory has provided a compact, repeatable test bed for the next generation of very-high-speed rail.
If the program reaches its planned 800 km/h routine speed later this year, it will tighten the gap between conventional open-air maglev and the low-vacuum “hyperloop-class” concepts now in early trials.
For now, the record illustrates how incremental advances, higher-power motors, tighter sensor loops, and smarter propulsion algorithms can cooperate to shorten test cycles and accelerate commercial rollout.
Li Weichao noted that the same toolkit is already migrating into other research facilities and could seed civilian applications beyond passenger rail.
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Kaif Shaikh Kaif Shaikh is a journalist and writer passionate about turning complex information into clear, impactful stories. His writing covers technology, sustainability, geopolitics, and occasionally fiction. A graduate in Journalism and Mass Communication, his work has appeared in the Times of India and beyond. After a near-fatal experience, Kaif began seeing both stories and silences differently. Outside work, he juggles far too many projects and passions, but always makes time to read, reflect, and hold onto the thread of wonder.
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