Starlink V3 satellite the size of Boeing 737 to bring 10x faster Internet downloads and 5 ms latency for gaming
SpaceX will start launching the bigger and better Starlink V3 satellites in even lower Earth orbit this year or in early 2026.
A single Starlink V3 satellite is apparently closing in on the size of a Boeing 737, tipped Elon Musk during his "Road to Making Life Multiplanetary" keynote before SpaceX employees.
These huge satellites will be taken to orbit by the larger, Mars-ready Starship 3 rocket that should become operational by the end of the year.
Since they will be brought up to a lower altitude of 350 km instead of the current 550 km orbit, the Starlink V3 satellites will be able to offer much lower latency of under 20 milliseconds, making it suitable for gaming. Musk then teased Diablo gameplay on Starlink while airborne, saying that the V3 satellite latency can even go down to 5 ms.
Besides the lower orbit, Starlink V3 satellites will bring faster Internet speeds and lower latency due to the fact that the laser beams that carry the packets of data travel 40% faster than fiber optics in vacuum.
Actually, the V3 satellite that is the size of a Boeing 737 when unfurled will bring 1 Tbps download speeds, or more than ten times what the current V2 generation offers. When it comes to uploads, the improvement will be even more drastic, with 24x the current speeds, or 160 Gbps.
Moreover, with the new Starship 3 rockets that are the size of a 747, SpaceX will also be able to launch double the amount of V3 satellites into orbit each time, despite that they weigh nearly two tons. This led to the claim that SpaceX will at one point be able to send 5,000 Starlink satellites into orbit annually.
According to Musk, the V3 satellites that bring about faster Internet speeds, lower latency, and more subscriber capacity, will start launching in the next six to nine months, so next year's Starlink satellite Internet coverage should be greatly improved.
Needless to say, SpaceX is also preparing new Starlink satellite Internet gear that will take advantage of those newfangled gigabit speeds, though the kits are likely going to be offered for enterprise use at first.
