The Spacelab components were used on 25 shuttle flights, but the components were decommissioned in 1998 except the pallets. Science work was to be moved to the International Space Station and Spacehab module, a pressurized carrier similar to the Spacelab Module. A Spacelab Pallet was recommissioned in 2002 for flight on STS-99. The "Spacelab Pallet - Deployable 1 (SLP-D1) with Canadian Special Purpose Dexterous Manipulator, Dextre" was launched on STS-123. "Spacelab Pallet - Deployable 2 (SLP-D2)" was scheduled for STS-127

In addition to the laboratory module, the complete set also included five external pallets for experiments in vacuum, built by British Aerospace (BAe) and a pressurized igloo containing the subsystems needed for the pallet-only flight configuration operation.

Eight flight configurations were qualified though more could be assembled.

Pallet
The Spacelab Pallet is a U-shaped platform for mounting instrumentation, large instruments, experiments requiring exposure to space, and instruments requiring a large field of view, such as telescopes. The pallet has several hard points for mounting heavy equipment. The pallet can be used in single configuration or stacked end to end in double or triple configurations. Up to five pallets can be configured in the Space Shuttle cargo bay by using a double plus triple pallet.

A Spacelab Pallet was transferred to the Swiss Museum of Transport for permanent display on 5 March 2010. The Pallet, nicknamed Elvis, was used during the eight-day STS-46 mission, 31 July - 8 August 1992, when ESA astronaut Claude Nicollier was on board Shuttle Atlantis to deploy ESA's European Retrievable Carrier (Eureca) scientific mission and the joint NASA/Italian Space Agency Tethered Satellite System (TSS-1). The Pallet carried TSS-1 in the Shuttle's cargo bay.

Igloo
On spaceflight where a habitable module was not flown, but pallets were flown, a pressurized cylinder known as the igloo carried the subsystems needed to operate the Spacelab equipment. The igloo was 10 feet tall, had a diameter of 5 feet, and weighed 2500 lbs. Two igloo units were manufactured, both by Belgium company SABCA, and both were used on spaceflight. An igloo component was flown on Spacelab 2, Astro-1, ATLAS-1, ATLAS-2, ATLAS-3, and Astro-2