Starlink has just rolled out an affordable Internet plan. Let’s see if you can actually get it

On November 10, Star link has quietly released a support page detailing its latest move toward affordability: a $40 monthly plan with no equipment fees and, in some regions, free installation. That’s half the price of Starlink’s previous entry-level plan.

A trap? You’ll get budget speeds for this budget price. Starlink limits download speeds to 100 Mbps on the new plan, which is dryly dubbed the “Residential 100 Mbps” service plan. There is no limit on download speeds, but Starlink’s specifications page lists expected speeds between 15 and 35 Mbps.

For a long time, Starlink residential customers had only one option: $120 per month, plus $349 for equipment. But earlier this year, Starlink launched its Residential Lite plan, which brought the monthly price down to $80 in exchange for reduced speeds. (Starlink also offers a $50 per month Roam plan designed for use on the go with the Starlink Mini dish, but data is capped at 50GB each month.)

In the three years I’ve been writing about Starlink, I’ve heard the same thing from people in broadband circles. Yes, this is a real game changer for rural broadband, but the reason most people don’t have good internet is because they can’t afford it. Now it’s priced on par with some of the cheapest internet plans on the market.

Can you benefit from Starlink’s affordable plan?

Where you can actually get the $40 plan is an open question. Starlink’s website says its plans and promotions vary depending on your location and the type of service you have, and that some offers “are only available in certain areas or for specific account types.” It continues: “If you don’t see a particular offer in your account, it just means it’s not currently available for your current service location.”

On Starlink’s residential service website, I checked ten random addresses across the country and found only one area where the plan was actually available: a rural town in Nevada. SpaceX, the owner of Starlink, did not respond to my request for additional information, but I assume it is only offering this plan in areas where Starlink has excess capacity.

Because Starlink relies on thousands of satellites in the sky to beam internet to your home, it isn’t able to handle as many users as cable or fiber optic internet providers. A study released this summer estimated that Starlink could only connect 6.66 homes per square mile before dropping below the FCC standard of 100/20 Mbps for broadband speeds.

Where I live in Seattle, Starlink currently charges an extra $1,000 due to high demand in the area. To attract users with a monthly price of $40, it is probably only available in sparsely populated places.

Is 100 Mbps speed enough?

Starlink says its speeds go up to 100 Mbps on the $40 plan, but I suspect your typical speeds will be slightly lower than that. The most recent data from Ookla found that Starlink customers enjoy median download speeds of 104.71 Mbps, well below the advertised maximum 305 Mbps. (Disclosure: Ookla is owned by the same parent company as CNET, Ziff Davis.)

That said, assuming the 100Mbps residential plan is only available in areas where there aren’t many other Starlink users, I wouldn’t be surprised if you get close to those speeds. But is 100 Mbps enough?

For me it absolutely would be. I live alone and don’t do a lot of bandwidth-intensive activities like online gaming or downloading large files. However, the more devices you add to the mix, the faster the 100 Mbps will run out. Starlink says the plan is best suited for “2-3 person households with daily internet needs,” but that seems slightly optimistic to me. The 100 Mbps number assumes you’ll be connected via Ethernet and will lose some speed over Wi-Fi.

If everyone in your house only uses one device at a time for simple tasks like browsing social media or streaming music, I imagine two or three people would get by with 100 Mbps. But if you want to do things like stream 4K video and play online games simultaneously, I think this plan would struggle to follow.