Orlan-10

The Orlan-10 is a Russian reconnaissance UAV used for observation, mapping, and artillery support.

Orlan-10 at a glance

What the public record establishes

Russian and Ukrainian official materials identify the Orlan-10 as a Russian UAV used in the war. The Ukrainian sanctions database also maps the product to several Russian entities and component suppliers.

The distinction between platform identity and event attribution matters. A manufacturer page can establish what a drone is; an official military release, UN report, or conflict-monitoring source is needed to establish where it appears in a war. Where those records do not align, this page keeps the uncertainty visible.

This is a non-operational reference page. It explains the manufacturer, platform family, and public conflict record without providing instructions for building, targeting, deploying, or modifying a weapon system.

Orlan-10 vs Orlan-30

The Orlan-30 is a heavier airframe in the same design family that integrates a laser designator to paint targets for precision artillery, whereas the baseline Orlan-10 drone acts primarily as an optical spotter that transmits coordinates. In operational use documented by Army Recognition, Russian batteries pair the Orlan-30 with 152 mm 2A65 Msta-B towed howitzers firing 3OF39 Krasnopol guided artillery projectiles.

The Krasnopol shell homes directly on reflected laser energy at ranges up to 20 km. The Orlan-10 cannot illuminate targets on its own, so it passes grid data back to battery fire-control posts instead of guiding a round down to terminal impact.

Carrying that targeting equipment requires a larger aircraft. According to Ukraine's GUR War & Sanctions database, the standard Orlan-10 features a 3.1 m wingspan, a maximum takeoff weight of 18 kg, and an endurance of up to 16 hours. Published specifications for the Orlan-30 indicate a heavier build and reduced flight duration.

At the ADEX 2024 defense exhibition in Baku, exporter Rosoboronexport presented figures reported by EDR Magazine listing an 8-hour endurance, a 3.9 m wingspan, a 30 kg takeoff mass, and a 5 kg payload capacity. Those figures vary across defense expositions: at the World Defense Show 2024, Rosoboronexport marketing reported by Army Recognition listed a 40 kg takeoff weight and a 6 kg payload limit.

The primary addition driving that weight is the optoelectronic sensor payload. EDR Magazine reported that the Orlan-30 carries a gyrostabilized turret housing a thermal imager, a daylight sensor, and a 1,064 nm pulsed laser designator-rangefinder effective between 200 and 8,000 m. Both airframes launch from a catapult and land by parachute, and Ukraine's GUR database lists Special Technology Center as a maker of both.

The Orlan-30's published endurance is 8 hours against the Orlan-10's 16, so each Orlan-30 sortie gives half the observation time. Militarnyi reported that soldiers of Ukraine's 54th Mechanized Brigade shot down an Orlan-30 in the summer of 2022.

Public pricing exists for only one of the two aircraft. Estimates from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), reported by Euromaidan Press, put the unit price of an Orlan-10 between $87,000 and $120,000. Rosoboronexport's exhibition figures, as reported by EDR Magazine and Army Recognition, include no Orlan-30 price, and no other published Orlan-30 unit cost was found.

The military drone cost guide explains how to weigh unpublished prices. Within the wider fleet of Russian drones, the Orlan-30 is the laser-designation airframe and the Orlan-10 is the spotter.

Wars covered

• Russia–Ukraine War — 2014–present; full-scale invasion from February 2022