Elon Musk’s companies have had their fair share of highs and lows in the eyes of the public, but SpaceX may have recently taken the lion’s share of goodwill through a series of successful launches and tests of its rocket and crew capsule. It was also the most recent recipient of some heavy criticism for its Starlink satellites that photobombed the NEOWISE comet. Its controversial presence in the Earth’s skies, however, may be worth considering if these figures are anything to go by using Ookla’s popular Speedtest.
To be clear, none of the anonymous test results on Ookla’s website even come close to Musk’s promise of gigabit internet and less than 20 ms latency coming from its Starlink satellite constellation. The fastest download speed was recorded at 60 Mbps while uploads were converted at 17.70 Mbps. Latency, on the other hand, ranged from 31 to 94 ms.
However, one would have to consider that there are currently only 600 Starlink satellites in Low-Earth Orbit or LEO, about 570 km at the highest peak. SpaceX has been reluctant to launch 12,000 satellites, at which point the constellation would be most in full operation to deliver those promised speeds. Or at least that’s the theory.
Even the lowest 11 Mbps shown by these Speedtest results is enough to impress Internet users who are at 1 Mbps or even slower. The goal of SpaceX is to make broadband internet itself available and especially for areas where DSL, cable, fiber optic, or even geostationary satellites are out of reach. For these areas, 11 Mbps would already be internet sky.
Of course, Starlink’s promise does not come without a price, as evidenced by astrophotographers of the night sky. The presence of 600 satellites is already proving controversial for the astronomy community, let alone when a 12,000-strong fleet is already in full force around our planet.
