Airlines have been predicting better WiFi in the sky for years, and those forecasts have aged as badly as the overly optimistic delay updates that turn a short flight into a 22-hour odyssey.
But in recent years, a meaningful upgrade has finally begun to arrive as satellites in lower orbits elevate in-flight connectivity — led by SpaceX’s Starlink, thanks to that constellation’s adoption by so many airlines.
Among domestic carriers, United Airlines is the furthest along in installing Starlink, followed by Alaska Airlines and its subsidiary, Hawaiian Airlines; and then Southwest Airlines. American Airlines and Frontier Airlines have announced their own Starlink plans but have yet to start replacing their existing satellite systems.
Starlink really is fantastic
I’ve used Starlink on flights with United and Alaska as well as Aer Lingus and Qatar Airways, and it is unquestionably the best WiFi I’ve tried in the air. Its download speeds routinely exceed 200 megabits per second, with upload speeds of 20 Mbps or faster — better than the WiFi in some airports.
After years of coping with WiFi that stutters and stumbles, it feels liberating to have a connection that just works, on all of my devices, for free.
SpaceX delivers that with a vast array of satellites — 9,726 satellites in operational orbits, per the count maintained by astronomer Jonathan McDowell — that zip around the Earth at altitudes as low as 205 miles.
Older in-flight WiFi systems rely on fewer satellites in geostationary Earth orbits — 22,000-plus miles up. That distance lets satellites stay parked over one spot on Earth and cover much of a hemisphere.
But it also results in painfully slow uploads and imposes noticeable lag as your data takes more than a 44,000-mile round trip.
It’s still not like good WiFi on the ground
But while airline executives and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk have touted a WiFi experience like using broadband at home, the reality at 35,000 feet can be different. At many airlines, you’ll have to log in with a frequent-flier number and then watch an ad — two at United, one of which has always been for Starlink itself.
And while airlines offering Starlink provide it free by paying SpaceX up front, you can’t count on that sticking industry-wide.
Frontier’s announcement conspicuously lacked any mention of free service, while Panama-based Copa Airlines will offer Starlink free only to business-class and elite-status passengers. Neither carrier has published further pricing details.
And few airlines have deployed Starlink across enough of their fleets to let you bank on enjoying it on your next flight. At United, for example, your Starlink odds range from almost 100 percent on its larger regional jets to near zero on international wide-bodies.
Starlink is also unlike other broadband providers because of how Musk is the inescapable face of the franchise. Many people dislike him for causes such as the DOGE upheaval of government agencies to his turning X into his hyperpartisan political playground, and they’re not keen on doing business with his companies.
Starlink isn’t the only upgrade available
Starlink’s most public rival for fast in-flight connectivity from low Earth orbit has won the business of two U.S. airlines — Delta Air Lines and JetBlue — but has yet to connect passengers.
Amazon says its Leo satellite constellation is nearing initial commercial service for land-based customers by the end of this year, even after losing the launch capability of Blue Origin’s giant New Glenn rocket after one exploded on its sole pad at Cape Canaveral, Florida, in May.
(Amazon founder and Blue Origin CEO Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
But in-flight Leo is further off, with JetBlue installations expected to start in 2027 and Delta’s in 2028.
Meanwhile, airlines in other countries are deploying service from Eutelsat’s OneWeb smaller constellation of low-orbit satellites and Intelsat’s combination of low- and geostationary-orbit satellites, with results that have impressed reviewers.
And a report published in April by the bandwidth-analysis firm Ookla, drawing on data from its widely used Speedtest app, found that some GEO services can deliver respectable downloads when managed well, citing median speeds above 40 Mbps for Intelsat and Viasat.
Even if you think Starlink is fantastic, you shouldn’t fantasize about that company locking up the market. Telecom monopolies make it easy for the monopoly to impose rate increases, as some Starlink users in rural areas have learned.
Slow or messaging-only WiFi may be enough
If your flight has only old-school, slow WiFi, you can still get reasonable utility out of that bandwidth by working around its limits. Save uploading any large files for after you land, and focus your time in the air on the least data-intensive applications — such as reading and closing all those open tabs in your browser and doing something about the email already overwhelming your inbox.
Or just stick with the free, messaging-only WiFi option most airlines offer. Even the most miserable connection should be able to keep a text chat current on your phone and let you stay in touch with the people most important to you (and, unfortunately, see campaign fundraising texts keep rolling in).
You also remain free to resort to my own in-flight productivity hack: keeping a laptop offline. That leaves nothing but the view out the window and whatever’s on the seat-back screen — most often, the flight map — to distract me from what I’m trying to write.
The post The best way to get great airline WiFi — and why you might not want to appeared first on Washington Post.
