Qatar Airways partners with Elon Musk’s Starlink for high-speed Wi-Fi

Qatar Airways launched Tuesday its inaugural Boeing 777 flight equipped with Elon Musk’s Starlink internet, paving the way for a new era of in-flight connectivity across its entire fleet by next year. 

To demonstrate the milestone, Qatar Airways CEO Badr Al Meer held a video call with Starlink founder Musk while flying at 35,000 feet from Doha to London.

“We’re literally just talking over Starlink right now – that’s super cool,” Musk said on the call from his home, which was filmed and released by the Qatari airline. “It’s Starlink across the laser links of the satellites all the way to your aircraft.”

Qatar Airways’ move to introduce free high-speed internet across its fleet is a direct challenge to competitor airlines who typically offer lower-speed and often patchy paid services, or status-restricted wi-fi access to the flying public. 

“It’s going to get better. We launched new satellites and keep improving the software. Over time I think you’ll find it just gets better and better,” Musk said before Al Meer gave him a video tour of the cockpit. 

“Think of this as the minimum. It only gets better from here,” Musk said to Qatar Tourism Chairman Saad bin Ali Al-Kharji, who was sitting next to Badr Al Meer on board the flight. 

The Qatari state carrier plans to deliver 12 Boeing 777-300s equipped with the service by the end of 2024, with coverage for the entire Boeing 777 fleet in 2025 and its Airbus A350 fleet following in the summer of 2025.

Starlink, which operates as a satellite internet constellation, provides high-speed and low-latency internet via some 6,000 satellites, allowing passengers to stream videos, send messages and hold calls over wi-fi on multiple devices. Qatar Airways, which is undertaking a major strategic overhaul under its new leadership, added that the service will be free of charge and will be operative from gate to gate.

The Gulf airline will be the first in the Middle East and North Africa region to offer Starlink-supplied wi-fi to its passengers, it said in a company statement. But it’s certainly not alone in its aims – earlier in October, Air New Zealand CEO Greg Foran told CNBC that reliable and speedy wi-fi on full-service carriers will become “ubiquitous” as airlines compete to provide enhanced services for travelers.

For its part, Air New Zealand announced in late 2023 that Starlink would be launched on two of its domestic aircraft by late 2024.

Qatar Airways told CNBC in March that it was developing a First Class concept and pursuing aircraft orders from aviation giants Boeing and Airbus, as part of its “Qatar Airways 2.0” strategic overhaul.

It comes as new IATA data shows global passenger demand continued to soar in August, rising 8.6% compared to August 2023. Middle Eastern carriers saw a 4.9% year-on-year increase in demand.