SES-9 is a geostationary communications satellite operated by SES It was launched from Cape Canaveral SLC-40 by a Falcon 9 Full Thrust launch vehicle on 4 March 2016.

SES-9 is a large communications satellite operating in geostationary orbit at the 108.2° East, providing communications services to Northeast Asia, South Asia and Indonesia, maritime communications for vessels in the Indian Ocean, and mobility beams for "seamless in-flight connectivity" for domestic Asian airlines of Indonesia and the Philippines.

The satellite was built by Boeing, using a model BSS-702HP satellite bus.

SES-9 had a mass of 5,271 kg (11,621 lb) at launch, the largest Falcon 9 payload yet to a highly-energetic geosynchronous transfer orbit (GTO). SES used the spacecraft's own propulsion capabilities to circularize the trajectory to a geostationary orbit.

SES-9 has 57 high-power Ku-band transponders, equivalent to 81 transponders of 36 MHz bandwidth and, co-located at 108.2°E alongside SES-7, it provides additional and replacement capacity for DTH broadcasting and data in Northeast Asia, South Asia and Indonesia, and maritime communications for the Indian Ocean. Broadcasts are on six Ku-band coverage beams:

In addition to the earlier SES-8 mission ordered in 2011 and launched in 2013, SES contracted SpaceX for three additional launches starting with SES-9, originally planned for 2015. The deal was announced on 12 September 2012. In early 2015, SES announced that it would be the launch customer of the next rocket evolution by SpaceX: Falcon 9 v1.1 Full Thrust (also called Falcon 9 v1.2, and later, just Falcon 9 Full Thrust). At the time, SES expected SES-9 to be launched by September 2015. Despite the failure of the CRS-7 mission in June 2015, SES re-confirmed in September 2015 their decision to provide the first payload for the new rocket variant; however the launch was postponed until late 2015.

Eventually, after considering all options, SpaceX announced a change on 16 October 2015: Orbcomm's 11 Orbcomm-OG2 satellites would be the payload on the return-to-flight mission of the redesigned rocket instead of SES-9. The Orbcomm payload with its lower orbit would allow SpaceX to test relighting the second-stage engine, a capability required to successfully put the heavier SES-9 on a geostationary orbit. The Orbcomm mission was subsequently delayed to mid-December 2015, while SES-9 was scheduled to follow "within a few weeks". Finally, Falcon 9 Full Thrust performed its maiden launch on 22 December 2015, the final launch of the Falcon 9 v1.1 variant followed in January 2016, with SES-9 moving to February 2016. Consequently, this was the second launch of the Full Thrust variant.

A successful static fire test of the rocket was completed on 22 February 2016.