Getty Images | Bold Bureau
Starlink informed users of a new monthly fee where people living in “limited capacity” areas would pay $30 more per month than users in “excessive capacity” areas. The changes consist of raising prices for many users and lowering prices for others.
Starlink’s original price was $99 per month, but since the price increase imposed in March 2022, SpaceX is charging all residential users $110. The price is $120/month, with a “$20 price reduction in areas with excess capacity” to a new price of $90/month.
An email to users in limited-capacity regions read, “As a current customer, limited capacity, the monthly service fee will increase to $120/month starting April 24, 2023. For new customers in your area, the price increase will take effect immediately. If you don’t want to continue with the service, you can cancel at any time on your account page. ”
The email says that SpaceX’s continued satellite launches have increased capacity, and that “the Starlink team is making ongoing updates to the network to improve performance over time.” But it says nothing about whether a limited capacity area can become an overcapacity area or vice versa.
Speeds can vary widely by region, but this shift usually means users receiving the lowest speeds pay the highest rates. , the number of customers in congested areas may decline and average speeds for remaining users may rise. shown in the test data.
Users lament price increases and lack of choice
A Starlink customer in South Carolina near Columbia received a limited email and shared it with Ars. “I can’t say I’m happy about it, but I don’t have much of a choice,” said customer Andy, who preferred not to reveal his last name.
Andy, who lives in a sparsely populated rural area, said “the only option is AT&T DSL, which barely works.” He also said Starlink’s speed has “decreased considerably” since he started using it in April 2021.
Download speeds, which used to be 200-250 Mbps, have dropped to around 90-100 Mbps, and upload speeds have dropped from around 25-30 Mbps to 8-9 Mbps, according to Andy. He said that between 4pm and 8pm, he saw upload speeds down to 4 Mbps. “Recently, in the evenings, he started seeing a lot of buffering when he was watching shows on HBO Max,” he said.
Some users may cancel instead of paying more, but “for users who have no choice, it’s the first cost increase and the second increase in less than a year,” Andy said. said.
Starlink’s coverage map shows most of the US is on the waiting list. This may indicate areas that are considered low capacity. In a submission to the Federal Communications Commission’s National Broadband Map, Starlink claimed to serve virtually the entire United States.
The price increase/decrease email has sparked a lot of discussion on the Starlink subreddit. “This increase doubled our previous ISP [charged], but they monopolized my area and were only offering 6Mbps,” wrote one user, adding that the actual speed was around 2Mbps on his previous ISP. Inflation has already negated my last two raises and this is not going to make it any easier,” the user wrote.
“When the price goes up, the quality goes down. This feels familiar,” another person wrote in a Reddit thread.
