Good news for Starlink users: The satellite internet system won’t begin enforcing its new high-speed data cap policy for users in the US and Canada until February.
Starlink's upcoming “Fair Use Policy” was supposed to take effect this month, requiring subscribers to potentially pay more to receive high-speed data after exceeding a 1TB monthly cap. But it looks like the company is pushing back the enforcement date. A user on Reddit spotted SpaceX quietly mentioning the change on a Starlink.com support page.
“To ensure our customer base is not negatively impacted by a small number of users consuming unusually high amounts of data, the Starlink team is implementing a Fair Use policy for Residential customers in the US and Canada and all Business/Maritime customers beginning February 2023,” SpaceX wrote.
In another support page post, the company adds that starting in February 2023, Starlink subscribers can opt in to automatically pay for high-speed data after exceeding the monthly cap.
The standard Starlink subscription starts at $110 per month. But under the Fair Use Policy, a customer will need to pay an additional $0.25 per GB after exceeding the 1TB cap. If they don’t, then SpaceX could throttle their data speeds during “times of network congestion” — or when too many users are consuming data on Starlink.
SpaceX is rolling out the Fair Use Policy to address congestion woes slowing down speeds across the network. Starting this year, download rates for Starlink have fallen for many users across the US and Canada when the technology's network capacity has been stretched.
The company’s long-term goal is to launch second-generation Starlink satellites to improve the system's broadband quality and capacity. But in the meantime, SpaceX has been forced to essentially ration out the high-speed resources to paying subscribers. That said, the company told customers in a previous email about the Fair Use Policy that less than 10% of Starlink users exceed 1TB in monthly data usage. Still, subscribers with large families will be among those most likely affected.
SpaceX didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. But the company has said users can monitor their monthly data usage on their account page and in the Starlink app.