(Credit: Starlink.com)
SpaceX has started inviting select users to buy the new Starlink Mini dish. But after alluding to a $250 or $300 price, the company will charge these early adopters $599 for the portable product.
The invites started going out on Wednesday and say: "As an early Starlink customer, you are invited to purchase the Starlink Mini Kit for $599.”
The price may put off some customers since SpaceX CEO Elon Musk initially said the Mini dish would arrive for “about half the price of the standard dish,” which currently costs $499, following a recent $100 price cut.
The same invite also notes that the Mini dish can only offer download speeds "over 100 Mbps." In contrast, the standard V4 Starlink dish, while larger, is capable of receiving download speeds of over 200Mbps, depending on the area.
On the plus side, SpaceX is reducing the monthly internet fee for the Starlink Mini dish to $30 per month, though the invite says that will be bundled "with your existing Residential service plan," which can currently cost $90 or $120 per month in the US.
SpaceX also signals that the $599 price for the Starlink Mini dish is temporary. “Our goal is to reduce the price of Starlink, especially for those around the world where connectivity has been unaffordable or completely unavailable. But in regions with high usage, where Starlink Mini places additional demand on the satellite network, we are offering a limited number of the Starlink Mini Kits to start for $599,” SpaceX says in the invite.
In other words, it looks like SpaceX needs to scale out manufacturing before it can bring down pricing for the Mini dish. A support page entry on Starlink.com adds: “Currently, the purchase of Starlink Mini is limited to a small group of customers in the US and is invitation only. We are unable to accommodate order requests from customers who did not receive an invitation.”
The company also plans on expanding the Mini sales to other markets. “However, we do not have estimated dates to provide at this time,” the company wrote.
The official support page on Starlink.com also offers more details about the internet plan for the Mini dish. The so-called “Mini Roam service” allows the subscriber to receive internet access “throughout” the US while using the Mini dish, with no speed caps. But on the downside, the support page listing notes: “Users will have 50GB of Mobile Regional data each month.” Other conditions say that users are barred from using the Mini dish in motion or pausing the monthly roam service.
The company sent out the invites after SpaceX published official specs for the Mini dish, which features its own built-in Wi-Fi router and is small enough to fit in a backpack. Although the Mini dish comes with a power supply to connect to an electrical outlet, it can also receive energy from a USB Power Delivery charger, so long as it has a "minimum rating of 100W, 20V/5A,” SpaceX says. That said, it looks like users will need to buy a "Starlink USB-C to Barrel Jack Cable" accessory from SpaceX to do so.