Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite broadband service is coming to India: How to pre-order, price, availability and other details

Elon Musk’s Starlink: Elon Musk’s ambitious super-fast internet venture is coming to India, and pre-bookings have opened up! Tech mogul Elon Musk has been working to fulfil his dream of a super-fast internet with the help of his venture called Starlink, under SpaceX. The Starlink satellites beam down internet to Earth from positions that are more than 60 times closer than traditional satellites, leading to low latency period, the company says. And now, this super-fast internet venture is set to come to India. The announcement has been made on the heels of the confirmation of Tesla’s debut in the country, indicating Musk’s interest in venturing out to the large market base that India offers. Here’s everything you need to know about it.

Starlink satellite: Availability in India
As per the Starlink website, the Starlink internet would reach India by next year, though the exact timeframe has not been shared. During pre-orders, it also seems to cover major cities like Delhi, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Chennai, Kolkata and Hyderabad among others. However, there is no blanket information available on the exact coverage details, and therefore users would need to check whether their areas are covered.
Starlink satellite in India: How to pre-book and pre-booking cost
Pre-booking Starlink is fairly simple. Users would need to head to the Starlink official website, and on the homepage, the option to order one would be available. Users would have to key in their PIN code, and once they find their area, click on ‘Order Now’. They would then be redirected to another page where they would have to fill in their details and pay the deposit amount within a stipulated time. If this is not done in the time provided, Starlink would abort the ordering process and load the homepage again.

The users would be required to pay a deposit fee of $99, or about Rs 7,300, which is towards the Starlink equipment that the users would have to install to get the internet connection. At the moment, however, Starlink is under beta and therefore, connections are limited and would be provided on a first-come-first-served basis. Once the user has made the payment, their priority access in their location gets reserved. The amount paid is fully refundable, allowing users to also backtrack on their decision at a later stage. Debit and credit cards can be used to make this payment.

Elon Musk’s Starlink: Internet speeds
For the Starlink project, SpaceX has already launched over 1,000 satellites. Currently, Starlink is providing an internet speed ranging between 50 Mbps and 150 Mbps, having a latency between 20 ms to 40 ms. In 2021 itself, however, the speed would be doubled to reach 300 Mbps, with the latency being reduced to 20 ms, Elon Musk has said. The ultimate goal of Starlink is to have a 12,000-satellite network that would provide a speed of 1 Gbps in the future.

Starlink is a revolutionary project because it aims to provide such high-speed internet not only in urban areas, like current broadband services, but also in rural and remote areas where present broadband services usually fail.