Starlink Internet Is Coming to These Airlines Early Next Year
Star link spreads its wings. British Airways and four other airlines in the International Airlines Group fleet will add the satellite internet service to hundreds of their planes from the beginning of 2026.
THE Starlink Wi-Fi in flight will be implemented on more than 500 Boeing and Airbus SE aircraft for Aer Lingus, British Airways, Iberia, Level and Vueling, and will be available on transatlantic and global routes as well as short-haul flights within Europe.
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Starlink is already available on United Airlines, Hawaiian Airlines, Alaska Airlines, airBaltic, Air France, Qatar Airways and WestJet. SAS, Air New Zealand and JSX have also announced that they will implement this service.
Internet connection during flights is evolving rapidly. Starlink continues to expand to various airlines, but it will face competition from Amazon. Kuiper Projectwhich plans to deploy thousands of satellites in low orbit. Amazon has already partnered with JetBlue to equip some of its planes with Kuiper technology.
Besides the Musk-Bezos options, there are plenty of ways to get in-flight Wi-Fi on major U.S. carriers, as we detail here.
IAG said its five airlines’ fleet consisted of 601 aircraft and each airline would determine its own Starlink deployment plans. IAG’s airlines, based in Spain, the United Kingdom and Ireland, carry 122 million customers to 260 destinations in 91 countries each year, the company said.
In terms of cost, an IAG representative told CNET that the company is not yet sharing details on how the service will be priced for passengers.
IAG CEO Luis Gallego said the company was trying to meet the internet demands of its passengers.
“Staying connected in the skies is increasingly important to our airline customers. The introduction of Starlink high-speed Wi-Fi will transform onboard connectivity, improving both connection speed and reliability for customers,” Gallego said.
Good news for flyer Wi-Fi?
CNET’s Jeff Carlson tested Starlink in flight and I was impressed. The quality of the video calls was “even better than a few recent calls we’ve had in our respective offices,” he said, and establishing the connection was as easy as in a coffee shop or hotel. Carlson says he was consistently enjoying 250 Mbps download speeds, compared to the 10 Mbps he was getting on United’s standard Wi-Fi access on a flight the day before.
Starlink Internet Wi-Fi speeds have also been shown to improve in-flight are actually faster than what you could get at home. If this seems counterintuitive, consider that Starlink’s fleet 7,000 satellites in low Earth orbit are much closer to your in-flight connection than the 22,000 miles between your connection at home with geostationary satellites.
