Since the 18th century, factories have been a mainstay of industrial societies, mass-producing goods and providing jobs for millions of people. As the products they manufacture have evolved in scale and technicality, the workplaces that facilitate production have also developed into the sophisticated operations we know today.
Making everything from aeroplanes to underwear, read on to discover the staggering size of some of the biggest factories in the world right now. All dollar values in US dollars.
Located in the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, the NASA Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) is the tallest single-storey structure in the world. It stands at 525 feet (160 metres) tall and was built in 1966 to assemble the Apollo/Saturn V moon rocket.
To this day, the VAB is the only building in which people have assembled a rocket that's carried humans to the surface of the moon. Most recently, the factory hosted the Orion spacecraft that was used in Artemis I, an uncrewed moon-orbiting mission that was launched on 16 November 16 2022. (The spacecraft landed in the Pacific Ocean on 11 December that same year). The VAB is also home to the largest-ever American flag, with the 209 feet (63 metres) tall, 110 feet (33 metres) wide patriotic banner painted on the outside of the building.
Gigafactory comes from the word “giga”, the unit of measurement representing billions. Tesla's Gigafactory 2, also known as Giga New York, is a 1.2 million square foot (111,500 square metre) facility in Buffalo. In 2017, Tesla started producing solar cells at the factory, which was originally a steel manufacturing site. The single-storey building stands on 88 acres right next to the Buffalo River and reportedly cost almost $1 billion (£813m) to build.
As part of its agreement with the State of New York, which actually owns the building, Tesla aims to create 5,000 jobs in the state's clean energy sector within the next 10 years. The COVID-19 pandemic threatened this aim; in the first six months of 2020 the number of employees at Gigafactory 2 slumped, with just 474 people working at the factory by April of that year. By the end of 2021, however, this number had returned to 1,460 workers.
Measuring roughly five football fields long and two wide, you might assume this factory produces cars, planes, or spacecraft. In fact, the Lauma Fabrics factory in Latvia makes something much smaller: underwear.
Established in 1969, Lauma Fabrics is Europe’s leading fabric manufacturer. As well as underwear, the factory also makes medical products such as elastic bandages and compression stockings under the brand name Lauma Medical.
The Jean-Luc Lagardère Plant in Toulouse-Blagnac, France, is the assembly hall and ground test site for the Airbus A380, the world's largest passenger aircraft. An estimated 50,000 tonnes of steel were used to construct the factory, which opened in 2004.
The impressively large Jean-Luc Lagardère Plant also boasts a restaurant, salons, a fluid and energy production plant, and even a congress centre.
The Belvidere Assembly Plant is located in Illinois, USA. The factory currently manufactures the Cherokee Jeep but was built in 1965 to assemble the Chrysler C platform vehicles. In 2006, it became the first Chrysler plant to have a body shop operated solely by robotics, with 780 robots on the factory floor.
The plant has been in operation since 1965 but repeatedly shut down production last year due to the global shortage of microchips and semiconductors. And the situation didn't improve. Last December, parent company Stellantis announced it would be "idling" the plant on 28 February this year, laying off 1,350 employees in the process.
Just outside Seattle, USA, the Boeing Everett Factory manufactures the Boeing 767, 747, 777, and 787 Dreamliner aircraft. Construction of the facility began in 1966 to meet the demand for 747s after Pan American Airways ordered $525 million worth of the craft. In today's money, that's the equivalent of over $4 billion (£3.25bn).
The plant, which employs around 30,000 people in total, houses an exhibition room, restaurants, coffee shops, a fire station, a theatre, and even a general store.
Austal USA is the American branch of an Australian shipbuilding company. Although the firm also has locations in Vietnam and the Philippines, this Alabama-based factory is its largest facility by a long shot, occupying a mammoth plot of land.
Austal USA assembles commercial ships such as ferries and cruise liners. Despite its Australian ownership, the plant also has special dispensation to work independently on sensitive projects such as combat vessels for the US Navy.
Gigafactory 2 isn't the only ambitious Tesla facility. The Tesla Fremont Factory in California has 5.3 million square feet (490,000 square metres) of space to produce the Model S, Model X, and Model 3 Tesla vehicles. Between 1962 and 1982, the factory was home to General Motors before being used by Toyota from 1984 to 2009. Tesla bought and remodelled the enormous building in 2010.
The Tesla Fremont Factory features an employee training centre, gym, 24/7 in-house medical centre, cafeteria, and outdoor patios. It currently employs 10,000 staff, but Elon Musk plans to double the facility's size to 10 million square feet (929,030 square metres) in the coming years, a move that's likely to create thousands of new jobs.
Tesla's original Gigafactory, located in the Nevada desert, produces Model 3 Tesla cars and lithium-ion batteries, a key component of electric vehicles. The factory has a footprint of 1.9 million square feet (176,515 square metres) with 5.3 million square feet (490,000 square metres) of operational space across several floors.
If the Tesla Gigafactory is only 30% finished as claimed, it could measure around 18 million square feet (1.7 million square metres) on completion. Tesla claims the building was built "out of necessity" to support the company's aim to produce 500,000 cars a year. According to Global Trade, experts have suggested that building lithium-ion battery plants in the US could help American manufacturers stop relying on exports from China, which has a "stronghold" on the industry.
Established in the city of Hwaseong in South Korea in 1990, this is the largest Kia car manufacturing plant in the world. The automobile company owns 13 other facilities across the globe and currently produces around two million vehicles a year.
The Kia Hwaseong Plant, also known as the Namyang Design Center, serves as the focal point for all Kia's engineering activities. These include design, prototyping, track testing, crash testing, and full-scale wind tunnel aerodynamic testing. The building is more than 150 times larger than the Kia Design Center in America, which reportedly measures 239,000 square feet (22,204 square metres).
Located in the city of Ulsan, South Korea, this enormous factory is the main production site for car manufacturer Hyundai. The company owns five different manufacturing plants in total. Between them, they take up as much space as 700 football pitches and churn out a new car every 10 seconds, according to Auto Express.
The mammoth Ulsan factory employs 34,000 staff and produces around 5,600 cars every day. It comes equipped with its own port, fire station, and even a hospital.
The Wolfsburg Plant is the global headquarters of German car company Volkswagen. Measuring a staggering 700 million square feet (65,000 square metres), it currently produces 11 different models of car. Until September 2021, the plant also produced the Volkswagen currywurst, a branded sausage that was sold in the factory's 17 different restaurants. Volkswagen is replacing the sausage with meat-free alternatives in a bid to lower its carbon footprint.
The Wolfsburg Plant has produced over 40 million cars since 1938 and currently employs around 65,000 people. It boasts the largest state-of-the-art paint shop in Europe and was the first car factory to use eco-friendly water-based paint.
And Volkswagen is keen to boost its environmental credentials. The company is set to build a new manufacturing plant for electric vehicles not far from its existing Wolfsburg Plant. It also aims to increase yearly production at the Wolfsburg Plant from 400,000 vehicles to 730,000, supposedly to keep up with the production capacity of rival Tesla.
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