United Airlines says it is accelerating the timeline for bringing Starlink broadband inflight connectivity to its fleet of more than 1,000 aircraft, starting with its Embraer E-175 twinjets.
“The airline now expects to begin testing Starlink next month with the first commercial flight anticipated to take off this spring on a United Embraer E-175 aircraft,” the US major says in a statement.
“United now plans to outfit its entire two-cabin regional fleet by the end of this year and have its first mainline Starlink-enabled plane in the air before the end of this year.”
Considering that United’s fleet is currently connected via multiple IFC vendors — including Panasonic Avionics, Viasat and Intelsat (formerly Gogo) — United’s equipage plan constitutes a major rip-and-replace program for the fleet, both for mainline and regional aircraft.
But other Starlink customers are also installing at a fast clip, including Qatar Airways, which by mid-December 2024 had fitted Starlink to 15 Boeing 777s; 14 of these were accomplished in a mere 55 days.
The Starlink package for larger air transport aircraft features at least two Starlink phased array antennas as part of a bandwidth play on the part of SpaceX.
As United vowed last fall, Wi-Fi access will be free for all MileagePlus frequent flyer members and “includes game-changing inflight entertainment experiences like streaming services, shopping, gaming and more”.
It has even set up a dedicated web page for people to sign up for MileagePlus using the promise of free Starlink-powered inflight Wi-Fi access as the incentive.
A Ku-band Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite solution, Starlink is not the only LEO game in town. Eutelsat OneWeb’s Ku-band LEO service is expected to debut soon in aviation, and both Telesat and Amazon have their sights set on delivering Ka-band LEO.
But with Starlink first out of the gate, it has won some clutch deals, attracting WestJet, Air France, airBaltic, Hawaiian Airlines, ZIPAIR, JSX and other undisclosed carriers as customers. (Bloomberg recently reported that IAG is in talks with SpaceX and Amazon over a potential inflight Wi-Fi deal.)
Regarding Starlink, United boasts that it holds “the industry’s largest agreement of its kind with SpaceX to bring Starlink to its entire fleet”. And it doesn’t mince words when it says, “This gate-to-gate connectivity will enable experiences in the sky at scale that no other major US airline provides, on seatback screens and personal devices simultaneously.”
Panasonic Avionics, which is tasked with bringing in-seat IFE to United’s narrowbody fleet, recently confided that it stands ready to integrate its IFE system with the connectivity pipe.
United rival Delta Air Lines, meanwhile, has been rolling out free Wi-Fi using Viasat’s high-capacity Ka-band geostationary satellite solution, and its Delta Sync experience is being extended to the seatback.
The age of broadband-connected in-seat IFE appears to be around the corner, a topic RGN discussed at length with Viasat on a recent #PaxEx Podcast.
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Featured image credited to United Airlines
