Internet service in the sky? That’s pretty easy these days—and fairly affordable as well. Internet service on the sea? That’s been a lot trickier.
Now satellite internet from Starlink, a company operated by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, is ready to begin offering a Web connection for boat owners, but it won’t come cheap.
Days after getting permission from the Federal Communications Commission to launch internet service to vehicles, the company has set a price of $5,000 per month to deliver internet to ships at sea. That’s on top of a $10,000 equipment charge.
Customers can pause the billing cycle when they’re not using the service for long periods.
With download speeds of 350 Mbps, the service is roughly on par with that of many households, and will allow multiple device connections at once. It’s not the gigabit speeds some people enjoy at home, but it’s certainly better than the complete lack of coverage available previously.
Residential customers who use Starlink pay $599 for hardware and $110 per month for service.
In a Tweet Thursday, Elon Musk explained the differences between the Maritime antenna and a home one.
Designed for both commercial boats and ships as well as personal yachts, the Starlink service isn’t completely global, though it does expect to expand coverage to new areas before the end of the year. Right now it works in the waters near the USA (not including Alaska), Europe (except most of Norway, Sweden, and Finland), Brazil, Chile, the southern part of Australia, and New Zealand.
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