SpaceX COTS Demo Flight 2 (COTS 2), also known as Dragon C2+, was the second test-flight for SpaceX's uncrewed Cargo Dragon spacecraft. It launched in May 2012 on the third flight of the company's two-stage Falcon 9 launch vehicle. The flight was performed under a funded agreement from NASA as the second Dragon demonstration mission in the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services (COTS) program. The purpose of the COTS program is to develop and demonstrate commercial sources for cargo re-supply of the International Space Station (ISS). The Dragon C2+ spacecraft was the first American vehicle to visit the ISS since the end of the Space Shuttle program. It was also the first commercial spacecraft to rendezvous and berth with another spacecraft.Initially, the objectives of the C2+ mission were to have been accomplished by two separate missions; Dragon C2 would have carried out a fly-by of the ISS, practiced rendezvous maneuvers and communications with the station, before returning to Earth. A second mission, Dragon C3, would have been the first mission to berth with the station. In July 2011, NASA gave tentative approval to combine the objectives of the two missions. In December 2011, NASA formally approved the merger of the COTS 2 and 3 missions into the Dragon C2+ flight. There were several launch delays, the last one occurring on 19 May 2012, due to a launch abort during the last second before liftoff.

Dragon C2+ successfully launched from Cape Canaveral on 22 May 2012. During the mission's first three days all of the COTS 2 objectives were successfully completed. The mission's COTS 3 phase began on 25 May when Dragon rendezvoused again with the ISS and then was successfully captured using the Canadarm2. It was berthed to the station later that day, using the robotic arm. Dragon stayed for almost six days during which the astronauts unloaded cargo, and then reloaded Dragon with Earth-bound cargo. On 31 May, Dragon unberthed from the ISS, its capsule landed in the Pacific Ocean off the California coast and was recovered. All the objectives of the mission were successfully completed, and the Falcon 9-Dragon system became certified to start regular cargo delivery missions to the ISS under the Commercial Resupply Services program.

The SpaceX Dragon, also known as Dragon 1 or Cargo Dragon, was a class of partially reusable cargo spacecraft developed by SpaceX, an American private space transportation company. Dragon was launched into orbit by the company's Falcon 9 launch vehicle to resupply the International Space Station (ISS).

During its maiden flight in December 2010, Dragon became the first commercially built and operated spacecraft to be recovered successfully from orbit. On 25 May 2012, a cargo variant of Dragon became the first commercial spacecraft to successfully rendezvous with and attach to the ISS. SpaceX is contracted to deliver cargo to the ISS under NASA's Commercial Resupply Services program, and Dragon began regular cargo flights in October 2012. With the Dragon spacecraft and the Orbital ATK Cygnus, NASA seeks to increase its partnerships with domestic commercial aviation and aeronautics industry.On 3 June 2017, the C106 capsule, largely assembled from previously flown components from the CRS-4 mission in September 2014, was launched again for the first time on CRS-11, with the hull, structural elements, thrusters, harnesses, propellant tanks, plumbing and many of the avionics reused, while the heat shield, batteries and components exposed to sea water upon splashdown for recovery were replaced.SpaceX developed a second version called Dragon 2, which is capable of transporting humans. Flight testing was completed in 2019, after a delay caused by a test pad anomaly in April 2019, which resulted in the loss of a Dragon 2 capsule. The first flight of astronauts on Dragon 2 occurred on the Crew Dragon Demo-2 mission in May 2020.

The last flight of the first version of the Dragon spacecraft (Dragon 1) launched 7 March 2020 (UTC); it was a cargo resupply mission (CRS-20) to International Space Station (ISS). This mission was the last mission of SpaceX of the first Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-1) program, and marked the retirement of the Dragon 1 fleet. Further SpaceX commercial resupply flights to ISS under the second Commercial Resupply Services (CRS-2) program use the cargo-carrying variant of the SpaceX Dragon 2 spacecraft.