My 5 Big Disappointments with Starlink

Starlink’s recent changes have tipped the scale AGAINST their favor. Here are the big disappointments with Starlink and the Starlink alternative RVers can turn to…

IMPORTANT UPDATE SINCE RECORDING THIS PODCAST: Starlink no longer offers Residential Portability.

That's the main topic we discuss in Episode 402 of the RV Podcast. You can watch the full video version below, in which we also share RV news and answer RV Lifestyle questions.

If you'd prefer an audio-only version of the podcast, you can listen to it on all the major podcast apps or just click the audio player below.

Added to my disappointments with Starlink is a huge potential problem

Just as we recorded this episode, we learned of a major threat to the satellite-based Internet service coming from DISH Network, which is heavily lobbying Congress and the FCC to claim new rights to the frequency spectrum Starlink operates in.

Starlink accuses DISH of hoarding spectrum for years "as a strategy for preventing open and fair competition. 

"Most recently, DISH has been attempting to claim new rights to the 12 GHz band, which is the spectrum you currently use to download content with Starlink," claims Starlink in a letter sent to its subscribers urging them to contact their representatives in Congress. "Despite technical studies dating back as far as 2016 that refute the basis of their claims, DISH has employed paid lobbyists who are attempting to mislead the FCC with faulty analysis in hopes of obscuring the truth."

Starlink claims "if DISH gets their way, Starlink customers will experience harmful interference more than 77% of the time and total outage of service 74% of the time, rendering Starlink unusable for most Americans."

The dispute is going to be bitterly fought and while it has nothing to do with our operational experience with the Starlink service, it's another potential issue that could certainly make our five disappointments much worse.

So while that issue works its way through the politics and conflicting claims of the various parties, let me talk about what we have directly experienced and the disappointments we have.

Starlink's Two Tiers of Service

Before we get to them, we need to explain the different types of services Starlink is offering.

IMPORTANT NOTE: STARLINK NO LONGER OFFERS RESIDENTIAL WITH PORTABILITY! 

Now that Starlink no longer offers Residential + Portability, there are only two main tiers of service.

* Residential - at $110 a month. This is for a fixed location. Many, many areas are already sold out and no new users are being accepted.

* RV - at $150 a month. You can use Starlink wherever you go, assuming you’ll get reception (See Disappointment #3).

There is also a business tier, but since that applies to very few RVers, we'll move on. 

5 Big Disappointments with Starlink

I want to focus the rest of this article on what we see as some issues with the service that Rvers need to be aware of.

#1) Starlink download speeds are not consistently fast

Don’t get me wrong. Starlink is fast.

Broadband fast, sometimes reaching speeds at well over 100 Mbps.

But you know what,