Starlink Expands, but Third-Quarter 2021 Performance Flattens in Some Areas

Satellite internet is making headlines across the globe as Starlink continues to launch service in new countries and Viasat plans to acquire Inmarsat. Speedtest by Ookla is here to check in on our ongoing series on satellite internet performance around the globe with fresh data from Q3 2021 to see if Starlink’s performance is holding up and how satellite internet compares to fixed broadband. In the United States, Starlink, which uses low earth orbit (LEO) satellites, was the only satellite internet provider with a median latency anywhere near that seen on fixed broadband in Q3 2021 with 44 milliseconds (ms) and 15 ms, respectively. Viasat and HughesNet, which both utilize higher “geosynchronous” orbits, had median latencies of 629 ms and 744 ms. Starlink performance also varies at the county level in the US; while there was about a 100 Mbps range in performance between the county with the fastest median download speed and the county with the slowest median download speed, even the lower-end speeds are well above the Federal Communications Commission’s Baseline performance tier of at least a 25 Mbps download speed. Ookla further examines Starlink's performance in twelve other countries around the world, adding Australia and Belgium this quarter.

[Isla McKetta is Head of Content at Ookla.]