Starlink tops satellite Internet download speeds and latency ranking

Starlink download speeds vary quite a bit, but subscribers can rest assured that they are way above the competition on average, too.

According to the latest Starlink speed tests and comparison with rival satellite Internet services, it beats them despite the significant increase in their performance in the same period, albeit not by some drastic margin.

Starlink vs Hughes vs Viasat Internet speeds

• Starlink - 104.71 Mbps
• HughesNet 47.79 Mbps
• Viasat - 49.12 Mbps 

The Starlink Residential tier promises average speeds of more than 150+ Mbps across the United States, but its median download speeds, as measured in Q1, are about 105 Mbps. This is still more than double the median speed of Starlink's main rivals, like HughesNet and Viasat, in the same period.

The Roaming tier with the Starlink Mini dish that is currently discounted by a third on Amazon offers lower, up to 100 Mbps download speeds, and 10 Mbps uploads, which is still an impressive number to hit with a mobile dish that can be used everywhere.

Still, both Hughes and Viasat offer dramatically higher median download speeds for 75% of their subscribers, closing in on those of Starlink, due to the launch of new satellites. Their subscriber count is much lower, though, and is dropping precipitously with the advent of Starlink.

Moreover, Ookla defines ping, or latency, as the weakest aspect of the satellite Internet service provided by Starlink's main competitors. Since Starlink's constellation is at a lower Earth orbit, its median Internet connection ping is 45 ms and dropping, while the medium orbit of Hughes satellites returned 683 ms in Q1, similar to the latency of Viasat.

Upload speeds are where Starlink tops the satellite Internet rankings, too, with 14.84 Mbps median uploads in Q1, against 4.46 Mbps for Viasat, and about the same for HughesNet.

All in all, Starlink is the best satellite Internet provider in the US. The 10x capacity promise of the V3 satellites that it is about to start launching next year is only going to widen the gap further, with the new Performance dish kit rated for gigabit speeds already.