This is a pretty cool story. I'd love to have the scratch to buy myself a ticket on this thing.
The spaceship was carried to an altitude of 45,000ft (13,700m) by an aeroplane and then dropped to glide back to the Mojave Air and Space Port.
Enterprise will soon be taking people prepared to pay $200,000 (£126,000) on short hops above the atmosphere.
The British billionaire behind the project, Sir Richard Branson, was on hand to witness the drop test.
"This was one of the most exciting days in the whole history of Virgin," the entrepreneur said.
"For the first time since we seriously began the project in 2004, I watched the world's first manned commercial spaceship landing on the runway at Mojave Air and Space Port and it was a great moment."
Virgin Galactic is aiming to become the world's first commercial space line, and has already taken deposits from 370 customers who want to experience a few minutes of weightlessness on a suborbital flight.
"We're not far off booking out our first year of operations," said Stephen Attenborough, head of astronaut relations at Galactic.
Enterprise will soon start rocket motor testing
"We'll see exactly how many we decide to fly in year one, but the intention has always been around 500. We're well on our way to that," he told BBC News.
The Enterprise ship is based on the X-Prize-winning SpaceShipOne vehicle, which made history in 2004 by successfully flying to 100km (60 miles) in altitude twice in a two-week period.
The new ship, built by Mojave's Scaled Composites company, is bigger and will be capable of carrying eight people - two crew and six passengers.
Virgin Galactic's suborbital spaceship, Enterprise, has made its first solo test flight, in California. Read more at www.bbc.co.uk
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