The government has hailed the Agni-V missile, with a range of 3,100 miles, as a major boost to its efforts to counter China's regional dominance and become an Asian power in its own right.
The head of India's Defence Research and Development Organisation, Vijay Saraswat, said the missile was launched from Wheeler Island off India's east coast.
It rose to an altitude of more than 370 miles, its three stages worked properly and its payload was deployed as planned, he said.
"India has emerged from this launch as a major missile power," he added.
The window for the launch opened on Wednesday night, but the test had to be postponed because of weather conditions. Avinash Chandra, mission director for the test, said that when the launch took place on Thursday morning the missile performed as planned, adding: "We have achieved exactly what we wanted to achieve in this mission."
The Agni-V is a solid-fuel, three-stage missile designed to carry a 1.5-ton nuclear warhead. It stands 57 feet tall, has a launch weight of 50 tons and was built at a reported cost of 25 billion rupees (486 million US dollars).
It can be moved across the country by road or rail and can be used to carry multiple warheads or to launch satellites into orbit. The missile will need four or five more trials before it can be inducted into India's arsenal at some point in 2014 or 2015, Indian officials said.
China is far ahead of India in the missile race, with intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching anywhere in India. Currently, the longest-range Indian missile, the Agni-III, has a range of only 2,100 miles and falls short of many major Chinese cities.
India hailed the test as a major step in its fight to be seen as a world power. Mr Saraswat said: "India has today become a nation with the capability to develop, produce, build long-range ballistic missiles and today we are among the six countries who have this capability."
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