Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k • Hacker News Board

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#31

Post by petilon » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:11 PM UTC

behnamoh wrote: post #13

As I write this, I'm disputing a charge from Starlink because when I activated mine, they automatically started the free trial for me, but nowhere in the receipt or on their website did they say they would switch me to the most expensive plan after the free trial was over. And they made it extremely confusing to cancel my free trial. So I ended up being charged $120 for something that I had just opened out of the box…

Apple Card aka Goldman Sachs is notoriously bad at handling disputes. They were fined $89 million for mishandling disputes, yet they continue to reject disputes offhand [1]. I no longer use Apple Card other than for Apple Store purchases.

[1] https://www.consumerfinance.gov/archive/newsroom/cfpb-orders...

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#32

Post by petilon » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:12 PM UTC

Blue Origin's Terawave [1] can't come soon enough.

[1] https://www.blueorigin.com/terawave

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#33

Post by epistasis » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:12 PM UTC

idontwantthis wrote: post #4

p-o wrote: post #2

Hard to not look at the crazy valuation of SpaceX and not see a correlation. At some point, something's gotta give.

Unfortunately, their valuation has almost nothing to do with starlink revenues. It’s almost entirely speculative oribital data centers that have not been invented yet. They could double their starlink revenues and it would have no impact on the valuation.

In the meantime, until Musk comes up with the next big "idea" to switch to, all the current revenue levers need to be pushed to max to try to make it to that next stage, since public companies demand revenue every quarter.

A lot of their revenue is also from renting out GPUs to more productive AI companies, so depending on how long that game can keep on going (getting access to GPUs before other companies), it could last for a while too.

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#34

Post by rsyring » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:13 PM UTC

delichon wrote: post #15

At the other end they recently doubled the cost of the Starlink Mini standby plan, from $60 to $120 per year.

I have a Starlink v2 dish and I pay $10 per month for a residential "standby" plan.

I only get 10G per month of bandwidth but I rarely use it since I have a fiber connection that is mostly reliable.

It might be a grandfathered plan because they don't list it anywhere I can see:

  - https://starlink.com/service-plans
  - https://starlink.com/roam

Edit: turns out this is a feature/mode and not a plan:

https://starlink.com/na/support/article/37bb3b47-9525-7224-5...

And, apparently, I now have to reactivate the service to one of the published plans if I want to use more than low-speed data. Previously, I still had high-speed bandwidth for $10 a month just not a lot of it.

They must have changed things recently. And, now that I'm thinking about it, I probably skimmed an email that said something about this a month or two ago but, since the charge was staying at $10 a month, didn't pay much attention to the details.

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#35

Post by Rebelgecko » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:13 PM UTC

BoppreH wrote: post #3

Note that this is for the "aviation plan" which already requires six-digits equipment.

They also recently doubled the price of the standby plan

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#36

Post by novafunc » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:14 PM UTC

mattmaroon wrote: post #22

justapassenger wrote: post #17

I’m pretty sure rest of starlink customers will get similar treatment in the future. Their potential customer base is limited and it’s only ISP that literately burns their backbone network every few years and has to replace to keep it running. On top of that, their claims it’s profitable does some heavy lifting with how to account for the cost of launching rockets. It’s extremely cool product and very useful for many…

Their potential customer base is literally everybody because they are the only ISP that can cover the entire globe. Everybody’s potential customer base is technically limited because there are only so many humans, but they have the least limited potential customer base of anything that exists.

Yes, but the primary reason for Starlink is for areas with poor traditional ISPs.

If you had a choice between Fiber or Starlink, you’d choose Fiber.

So as traditional ISPs improve service and coverage, Starlink becomes less in demand.

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#37

Post by justapassenger » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:15 PM UTC

mattmaroon wrote: post #22

justapassenger wrote: post #17

I’m pretty sure rest of starlink customers will get similar treatment in the future. Their potential customer base is limited and it’s only ISP that literately burns their backbone network every few years and has to replace to keep it running. On top of that, their claims it’s profitable does some heavy lifting with how to account for the cost of launching rockets. It’s extremely cool product and very useful for many…

Their potential customer base is literally everybody because they are the only ISP that can cover the entire globe. Everybody’s potential customer base is technically limited because there are only so many humans, but they have the least limited potential customer base of anything that exists.

For any dense populated area, starlink cost explodes exponentially to support customers there, while fiber/5G is linear.

You cannot just put more satellites on top of cities, as they aren’t geostationary (which is why they’re fast), so you need to add insane amount of satellites, that would do nothing most of the time, when they’re not on top of densely populated area.

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#38

Post by 0cf8612b2e1e » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:15 PM UTC

croes wrote: post #20

idontwantthis wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, their valuation has almost nothing to do with starlink revenues. It’s almost entirely speculative oribital data centers that have not been invented yet. They could double their starlink revenues and it would have no impact on the valuation.

Even if invented, what is the advantage of orbit data centers?

The best I have heard: It makes you fully independent of the terrestrial energy grid. There is also some nebulous freedom from governmental authority possibilities.

Both of which strike me as poor arguments. We are in a short term energy crunch. I expect within five years that most of the energy problems will be resolved and the eye watering financials of launching a GPU into space will look absurd

Governments also do not like to cede authority, so I find it hard to believe that they will not claim jurisdiction over any business operating within their borders (all of those ground stations).

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#39

Post by e_i_pi_2 » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:15 PM UTC

jameskraus wrote: post #30

It is an reckless business practice to not have the monthly price locked down, with strong contractual protections. Sounds like Correnti didn't negotiate well and are now finding out.

Agreed with this, and it also doesn't seem like this is the case but I'm generally a fan of charging B2B as high as possible to lower costs for regular consumers - other companies will generally pay a lot more even if it just includes the potential of getting better support, and that profit can be used to give access to more people at a lower price.

A lot of open source software uses this model - free for everyone, but if you're a company that wants support then you have to pay for it, and that covers the development for everyone

Re: Starlink unlimited aviation plan to rise from $10k/month to $20k

#40

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 5:15 PM UTC

mattmaroon wrote: post #22

justapassenger wrote: post #17

I’m pretty sure rest of starlink customers will get similar treatment in the future. Their potential customer base is limited and it’s only ISP that literately burns their backbone network every few years and has to replace to keep it running. On top of that, their claims it’s profitable does some heavy lifting with how to account for the cost of launching rockets. It’s extremely cool product and very useful for many…

Their potential customer base is literally everybody because they are the only ISP that can cover the entire globe. Everybody’s potential customer base is technically limited because there are only so many humans, but they have the least limited potential customer base of anything that exists.

[deleted]