Late last week, United Airlines announced a deal with Elon Musk’s SpaceX to provide Starlink internet service on all of its aircraft, and for the first time, free Wi-Fi for all passengers. To learn more about why United chose Starlink, how it’s rolling out, and what it means for passengers and crews, we spoke with Linda Zozo, United’s chief customer officer.
“If we could have made the change sooner, we certainly would have. We’re proud of a lot of things, but we think our customers deserve a better Wi-Fi experience than they have now,” Jojo said when asked why the company is switching providers now.
Currently, United uses a mix of four different vendors—Gogo, Thales, Panasonic, and ViaSat—all with different capabilities and limitations. For example, connecting flights may only support basic web surfing, while others may allow video streaming. While the airline has tried to integrate these systems into a single login experience, Jojo admits that it’s not always possible to protect customers from the underlying complexity.
Meanwhile, the expectation, partly set by United’s rival Delta Air Lines, is that Wi-Fi on flights should be free. But United’s current provider simply doesn’t have the capacity to provide free Wi-Fi to everyone on the plane, Jojo said.
“If we gave away what we had for free, we would have provided a worse experience than what we had with the paid option, because the paid option was just enough friction to say, ‘We’re going to be really intentional about our connectivity,’ which is $8 for a (MileagePlus) membership,” she said. “We knew that the architecture and setup we have today would not be sufficient.”
In search of a better solution, United looked to low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites, which by definition are closer to the aircraft than satellites in geosynchronous orbit, and thus can offer lower latency, more capacity, and higher speeds. And when it comes to providing satellite-based internet access with global coverage and ample bandwidth, Starlink is virtually the only game in town.
“If we were going to try it, we would try Starlink,” Jojo said. “We looked at the local fleet first and decided whether to try it or not. And we quickly said, ‘There’s nothing to try. We can see that it’s going to work.’ We could see what JSX and other people were doing. We could see that there was coverage where the satellites were.”
Earlier this year, United began negotiating with Starlink to install its hardware on its aircraft. Jojo noted that the certification process could also be expedited, as other airlines, such as Hawaiian (now merging with Alaska Airlines), are currently going through similar processes.
Interestingly, United plans to complete the actual retrofit in two days, and may even split it into two parts. That is, the process will begin while the aircraft is on base overnight, stop once the aircraft is in flight during the day, and be completed the second night. Typically, such a process is performed during a more complex multi-day maintenance check (and sometimes, that may still be the best time to install Starlink hardware).
In fact, the satellite terminal is much smaller and easier to install than the one United currently uses. “It’s another great example of how amazing Starlink is. It’s really well designed. It’s a very simple product. It’s much simpler than what we already have on airplanes,” Jojo said. “(The geosynchronous) satellite system has moving parts inside. The antenna tracks the satellite as the airplane flies. Starlink doesn’t need that. There are no moving parts inside the Starlink module anymore. It’s very modular.”
Still, with over 1,000 aircraft in the fleet, this rollout will take time, and if there’s one thing Jojo emphasized during our conversation, it’s that he wants to get it done as quickly as possible. Still, the first passenger aircraft with Starlink Wi-Fi won’t take off until sometime in 2025.
As United goes through this process, it’s also updating its cabins, bringing back seatback screens that were gone about a decade ago. The idea is to make these systems smarter and more powerful by connecting them to faster, more reliable Wi-Fi.
“We’ve been thinking about improving the Wi-Fi experience throughout this process,” JoJo said of the cabin refresh. “The Wi-Fi part, first and foremost, is a fast follower of the seatback part, so we’ll be catching up.”
This could mean watching an in-flight movie on your first flight and continuing to watch it on your connecting flight. It could also mean simply logging into your Netflix account to watch a movie, but United could also offer more interactive experiences on the seatback screens or multi-screen gaming experiences using your smartphone.
For crews, United is already using existing networks to help them communicate with each other and with ground teams. With Starlink in place, they will be able to switch from text-based messaging to video and voice, not only to talk to each other, but also to send video of equipment that needs repair after landing, for example. And because modern aircraft are loaded with sensors, the team will also be able to relay more sensors to the ground in real time, including for preventive maintenance.
