Elon Musk is offering high-speed internet to areas of the United States that have traditionally had trouble accessing fast speeds while browsing.
People who signed up for information on Musk’s Starlink service in June received an email Tuesday advertising the “Better Than Nothing Beta” test, a rollout of the satellite internet service that will be priced at $99 per month, according to screenshots of the emails reported on Tuesday by CNBC.
“Starlink will deliver high speed broadband internet to locations where access has been unreliable, expensive, or completely unavailable,” Starlink’s website reads.
A one-time upfront fee of $499 will be required for people who wish to try the beta test of the service, which has advertised itself as producing speed of 50 megabits per second to 150 Mb/s and latency from 20 milliseconds to 40 ms. The email also warned that “there will also be brief periods of no connectivity at all.”
This is the public rollout of the service that employees have been trialing all summer. The service taps into almost 900 already-launched version 1.0 satellites of what the company hopes to be more than 12,000 small satellites orbiting in low earth to provide fast, seamless connections around the globe.
Starlink is part of SpaceX, Musk’s aerospace manufacturer and space transportation company.
