The “Long March 5” rocket left the Wenchang launch site on the island of Hainan on Friday carrying a Shijian 20 test satellite. Launched at 12:45 GMT, the satellite was sent into its planned orbit after 33 minutes, according to Chinese news agency Xinhua.
The success of the launch puts the Chinese space programme back on track after a failed attempt in 2017.
According to China’s National Space Administration, it was a test of “key technologies related to future space missions”.
China is one of four nations planning to send a rover to Mars in 2020.
July 2020 marks the point when Mars and Earth are in the best position relative to each other, and thus the best point at which a rover could land safely on the red planet.
Other countries racing to get to Mars include the US, a joint European-Russian endeavour, and the first Mars mission by the United Arab Emirates.
With China set to enter the mix, three vehicles from Earth will be probing Mars’ surface in the hope of finding extraterrestrial life.
They hope to find any sort of sign by 2021.
China also plans to launch the core module of its new manned low Earth orbit space station in 2020 from the Long March 5 rocket.
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At the time, it said it was the most powerful launcher it had ever developed.
The Long March 5 is capable of carrying up to 25 tonnes, and is comparable to the US’ Delta IV and Russia’s Proton-M.
The most recent launch of the rocket is the third version of it, the second version was meant to put the Shijian 18 experimental communications satellite into orbit, but failed on take-off.
This delayed plans by China to use the rocket in a mission to collect lunar samples in the second half of 2017.
Billions of dollars worth of investment has since flooded into China’s space programme.
The ramped-up efforts intend to enable China to catch-up with its rival, the US, and affirm its status as a major world power.
China now spends more than Russia and Japan on its civil and military space programme.
In 2003, the Communist nation became only the third country to ever put a human into orbit and, in January, it became the first to land a probe on the far side of the moon.
Named after the moon goddess in Chinese mythology, the Chang’e-4 lander released a rover in the Moon’s South Pole-Aitken Basin shortly after New Year.
And, in November, China completed a test of its Mars exploration lander.