Abstract This paper presents a fundamental study of the aeroelastic behavior of hypersonic vehicles. Two separate configurations are examined. First, a typical cross-section analysis of a double-wedge airfoil in hypersonic flow is performed using three different types of unsteady airloads: piston theory and complete Euler and Navier–Stokes solutions based on computational fluid dynamics. The analysis of the double-wedge airfoil is used to justify the usage of the simple aerodynamics for a reusable launch vehicle (RLV). Subsequently, the aeroelastic problem for a complete vehicle that resembles an RLV in trimmed flight is considered, using approximate first-order piston theory aerodynamics. The results provided for these configurations provide guidelines for approximate aeroelastic modelling of hypersonic vehicles.