[4] Despite its huge surface area, Sunjammer has a thickness of only 5 μm, giving it an extremely low weight of about 32 kg (71 lb) and allowing it to be stored in a space the size of a dishwasher.

[4] Once in space, the large surface area of the solar sail would allow it to achieve a thrust of about 0.01 N[5] and a characteristic acceleration of about 0.25 mm/s2.

[6] To control its orientation, and via this its speed and direction, Sunjammer was to use gimballed vanes (each of which is itself a small solar sail) located at the tips of each of its 4 booms, instead of thrusters, eliminating the need for any propellant other than the rays of the Sun.

[2] Within two months of launch the spacecraft was to test various technologies, such as deployment, vector control via altitude vanes, and eventually reaching a location near the Earth-Sun L1 Lagrange point.

[4] Sunjammer was to carry two British space science payloads: the Solar Wind Analyser (SWAN) developed by the Mullard Space Science Laboratory of University College London,[7] and the MAGIC magnetometer developed by the Blackett Laboratory of Imperial College London.