Geran-5

Updated 18 September 2026: adds the first Geran-5 strikes on Kyiv, a type-level production figure, Ukraine's interception rate against jet Gerans, unit-cost estimates, the strike on the Tsymbulova launch site and Iran's reported request to buy the type.

The largest and fastest member of Russia's Geran family, and the one that stopped looking like a Shahed. About 6.5 metres long, cruise-missile shaped, up to 600 km/h on a Chinese turbojet, with a 90 kg warhead, the ability to be dropped from a Su-25 in flight and — per Ukrainian intelligence — to carry an air-to-air missile of its own.

Overview

The Geran-5 (Герань-5) is a jet-powered long-range one-way attack drone that abandons the delta-wing Shahed planform its predecessors inherited. Its airframe resembles a small cruise missile, and Ukrainian analysts classify it as a "missile-drone" — a category between a loitering munition and a subsonic cruise missile that Ukrainian manufacturers are developing in parallel. Ukraine's Defence Intelligence (DIU) identified the type on 11 January 2026 after its first combat use against Ukrainian territory, according to Militarnyi, and assessed that it is most likely not an indigenous Russian development, citing significant technological similarity to the Iranian Karrar.

Built at the Alabuga special economic zone in Tatarstan alongside the Geran-4, the two types together account for roughly 3,000 airframes a month as of August 2026 — more than the piston Geran-2 line they are displacing, according to DIU figures reported by Militarnyi. The Geran-5 is the heavier half of that pair: a 90 kg warhead against the Geran-4's 50 kg, a declared strike range of about 1,000 km, and the family's most powerful engine. It is also the minority share. The only type-level figure published so far, from military sources cited by RBC-Ukraine in September 2026, puts planned output at 800 Geran-5s a month against 1,200 Geran-4s. Since 2 September the type has been flown against Kyiv, and the Financial Times reported on 13 September that Iran has asked Moscow to supply it.

A note on the figures. Almost every specification here traces to Ukrainian intelligence disclosures or open-source photographic analysis, and the range figure in particular is genuinely contested: DIU's January disclosure and Militarnyi report about 1,000 km, while DIU's own War&Sanctions portal and a Ukrainian intelligence official speaking to RFE/RL give 950 km, and Defense Express cautions that practical reach on evasive routes may be 30–50% lower. The figures appear below with attribution.

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