United Airlines Free Starlink Wi-Fi Takes Flight, Coming To 1,000+ Planes

While there are lots of areas where United Airlines has been improving, Wi-Fi is an area where the carrier has historically lagged both American and Delta.

Fortunately that’s changing — in September 2024, United announced plans to introduce free Starlink Wi-Fi throughout its fleet. There’s an exciting update, as first plane with the new service is now flying. This will be a game changer for United, once available on a widespread basis.

United Airlines installing Starlink Wi-Fi on 1,000+ jets

United Airlines is partnering with SpaceX, to introduce Starlink Wi-Fi on more than 1,000 aircraft. This is the largest Starlink deal we’ve seen with an airline to date. Best of all, United plans to offer Starlink Wi-Fi for free to all MileagePlus members. That’s not surprising, when you consider that United is increasingly in Delta’s league, and Delta is offering fast and free Wi-Fi.

Starlink is known for its high-speed, low-latency broadband internet, and the service will be offered gate to gate. United highlights how Starlink Wi-Fi will allow for live streaming, productivity similar to on the ground (with high upload and download speeds), gaming, e-commerce, support for multiple devices, and more.

Starlink is becoming increasingly popular on airlines. So far we’ve seen carriers like airBaltic, Air France, Air New Zealand, Hawaiian Airlines, Qatar Airways, Scandinavian Airlines, and WestJet, all announce plans to install the service.

What’s also great about Starlink is that the installation process is pretty quick, once aircraft are certified to have it installed. The average Starlink installation time is around eight hours, which is 10 times as fast as with non-Starlink equipment.

United is by far the most tech-savvy US airline, and I’d be willing to bet that the airline invests more in technology than peers. So it’s fitting that United would also go with the most cutting edge Wi-Fi provider. This would also explain why United didn’t announce a larger Wi-Fi retrofit plan with one of the more established inflight Wi-Fi providers prior to the recent announcement.

Here’s how United CEO Scott Kirby describes this development:

“Everything you can do on the ground, you’ll soon be able to do onboard a United plane at 35,000 feet, just about anywhere in the world. This connectivity opens the door for an even better inflight entertainment experience, in every seatback – more content, that’s more personalized. United’s culture of innovation is, once again, delivering big for our customers.”

Here’s how United MileagePlus CEO Richard Nunn describes this:

“We have a lot planned for our MileagePlus members this year and adding Starlink to as many planes as we can – as quickly as we can – is at the center of it all. It’s not only going to revolutionize the experience of flying United, but it’s also going to unlock tons of new partnerships and benefits for our members that otherwise wouldn’t be possible.”

United Airlines Starlink Wi-Fi rollout progress & timeline

What’s United’s plan for rolling out Starlink Wi-Fi? United expects to offer Starlink Wi-Fi on 1,000+ planes, including mainline aircraft and regional jets.

United plans to first offer Starlink Wi-Fi on its regional jets. Starlink Wi-Fi was installed on the first United Express Embraer jet several months ago, so that the plane could receive the needed Supplemental Type Certification (STC) from the FAA. United now got the green light for this, so the first aircraft with this system is in commercial service.

It appears that the first aircraft with Starlink has the registration code N127SY. United now plans to install Starlink Wi-Fi on 40+ United Express planes each month. The entire two-class regional fleet, consisting of more than 300 aircraft, is expected to have the service by the end of 2025.

When you go to united.com and look up flight status, you can now tell if a flight is expected to have Starlink based on the below banner. Of course it’ll be some time before we see this on a widespread basis.

There’s no timeline beyond that as of now, other than that the entire fleet will get Starlink Wi-Fi “over the next several years.” So it sounds like we shouldn’t expect any mainline United jets to get this service before either very late 2025 or early 2026. Either way, the fact that all two-cabin regional jets will get Starlink before the end of 2025 is super impressive.

One thing that we do know is that United plans to have Starlink on its new premium Boeing 787-9s, featuring the new Polaris seats and Polaris Studio. Those are expected to be among the first wide body planes to get the service, and they’re expected to enter international service as of early 2026.

United will need to get an STC for each aircraft type, so that covers a total of 16 regional and mainline aircraft models. For some context on United’s Wi-Fi situation, prior to Starlink, the airline is using four different Wi-Fi providers:

• The regional jets have Intelsat Wi-Fi (formerly known as Gogo)
• Most wide body jets, plus select A319s, A320s, and 757s, have Panasonic Wi-Fi
• Most non-MAX 737s have Thales Wi-Fi
• Most 737 MAX aircraft, A321neos, and select A319s, have Viasat Wi-Fi

Bottom line

United Airlines is introducing free Starlink Wi-Fi throughout its fleet. United has been lagging American and Delta when it comes to inflight connectivity, so this will be a massively positive change.

Starlink Wi-Fi is first being installed on United Express regional jets, with the entire regional jet fleet expected to get Wi-Fi before the end of 2025. After that, we’ll see Starlink Wi-Fi installed on mainline aircraft, with at least newly delivered 787s expected to get Starlink as of late this year or early next year.

Over the coming years, we should see Starlink Wi-Fi installed on over 1,000 aircraft, though as you can tell, that’ll require some patience. Kudos to United for finally addressing its Wi-Fi challenges in the best way possible.

What do you make of United introducing Starlink Wi-Fi?