Amazon's Project Kuiper Strikes Its First Satellite Internet Deal With an Airline (theverge.com)
(Friday September 05, 2025 @03:00AM (BeauHD)
from the first-of-many dept.)
- Reference: 0179011098
- News link: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/25/09/04/2317243/amazons-project-kuiper-strikes-its-first-satellite-internet-deal-with-an-airline
- Source link: https://www.theverge.com/news/771459/amazon-project-kuiper-jetblue-satellite-internet
Amazon's Project Kuiper has [1]landed its first airline deal with JetBlue and plans to offer satellite-powered in-flight Wi-Fi starting in 2027. The Verge reports:
> Yesterday, Amazon's Panos Panay [2]showed off a speed test using an "enterprise-grade customer terminal" (aka, dish) to achieve a download speed of just over a gigabit. Fine, but we'll have to wait to see how it performs once individuals using consumer dishes at scale. Amazon says the first customers will start using the service this year, ahead of a broader rollout in 2026.
>
> Project Kuiper-powered Wi-Fi will be available on "select" aircraft initially. Amazon says its satellites will provide lower latency and "more reliable service" for passengers, as they orbit between 367 and 391 miles above Earth -- far closer than the geostationary satellites that orbit around 22,369 miles above the planet. Amazon has also struck a deal with Airbus to build Project Kuiper's satellite internet service into its aircraft.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/771459/amazon-project-kuiper-jetblue-satellite-internet
[2] https://x.com/panos_panay/status/1963336040120553811
> Yesterday, Amazon's Panos Panay [2]showed off a speed test using an "enterprise-grade customer terminal" (aka, dish) to achieve a download speed of just over a gigabit. Fine, but we'll have to wait to see how it performs once individuals using consumer dishes at scale. Amazon says the first customers will start using the service this year, ahead of a broader rollout in 2026.
>
> Project Kuiper-powered Wi-Fi will be available on "select" aircraft initially. Amazon says its satellites will provide lower latency and "more reliable service" for passengers, as they orbit between 367 and 391 miles above Earth -- far closer than the geostationary satellites that orbit around 22,369 miles above the planet. Amazon has also struck a deal with Airbus to build Project Kuiper's satellite internet service into its aircraft.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/news/771459/amazon-project-kuiper-jetblue-satellite-internet
[2] https://x.com/panos_panay/status/1963336040120553811
How much is that "speed" in apples? (Score:2)
by ArsenneLupin ( 766289 )
or in any other unit fitting speed or bandwidth?
Re: (Score:2)
by OrangAsm ( 678078 )
Libraries of congress per nanosecond is fun.
Latency (Score:2)
What's the latency like? That was the biggest issue I had with satellite internet. I think the theoretical minimum round-trip ping time was around 600ms, but it never was that good... realistic ping times were more like 1.2 - 3s depending on network conditions. Games? VOIP? Video call? forget it. SSH was painful.
Re: (Score:1)
I think you are thinking of geo stationary sats. I worked with a sat HD TV link bandwitch was about 6 Megabits per second and it was 400 ms plus. Kuiper like startlink are in LEO. So times are less than 100mS. YMMV
Re: (Score:2)
If Starlink is anything to go by (and Kuiper satellites are at similar altitudes) you’re looking at 25-50ms. My Starlink experience was over 18 months ago and there are are lot more satellites up than there were then so it might be more consistent.
Re: (Score:2)
Traditional comm's satellites are in geo-synchronous orbit, which means they orbit at the same speed the earth turns. So you can point a dish antenna at them and it stays fixed in place. But that is *very* high orbit.
Starlink and Kuiper are low orbit, so low lag. But it means you need a smart antenna array, to follow them across the sky, and switch between them. Cellphones can talk to them with a regular antenna, but only low bandwidth.
Re: (Score:2)
These low earth orbit satellites have very low latency. Probably no different from what you'd get from a terrestrial system. The bigger issue is contention - the more people under the footprint of a single satellite, the slower your speeds will be. Service could start out with brilliant rates and then slowly suck over time as more people start using it.