SpaceX Says Starlink Now Has Over 4.6 Million Customers: 1.6 Million New Users Added In 7 Months

Elon Musk‘s rocket manufacturing company SpaceX said on Tuesday that its Starlink satellite internet segment now has over 4.6 million customers in over 118 countries, territories, and other markets.

What Happened: SpaceX said in May that it is providing connectivity to 3 million customers, implying that the company added 1.6 million more customers in merely a few months.

The company completed 89 launches in 2024 dedicated to expanding its Starlink constellation and activated its service in 27 new markets, it said. Its constellation of satellites equipped with the capability to provide connectivity directly to LTE phones has now nearly 350 satellites, it added.

All in all, the company currently has over 7000 active Starlink satellites orbiting Earth.

Future Plans For Starlink: The company will soon launch its new version of Starlink satellites aboard its Starship launch vehicle, the company said on Thursday.

“Soon, Starship will launch our V3 Starlink satellites, which will add 60 Tbps of capacity to the network per launch – more than 20x per Falcon 9 launch today,” the company said.

However, the Starship is still in the testing and development phase and has yet to carry any major payload to space.

Why It Matters: The third generation of Starlink satellites, Musk has previously said, will be launched on the company's ambitious and larger Starship launch vehicle owing to their larger size. The new satellites, Musk then added, will allow for a 10X increase in bandwidth and reduced latency.

SpaceX currently launches its current generation of Starlink satellites to the low-Earth orbit on its Falcon rocket. 

The Starlink segment achieved a breakeven cash flow in November 2023 and continues to be a money-making segment for SpaceX.

"We are going to make some money on Starlink this year. But ultimately I think Starship (the company’s new rocket under development) will be the thing that takes us over the top as one of the most valuable companies," SpaceX COO Gwynne Shotwell said at a conference hosted by Baron Capital in November. However, Shotwell refused to divulge more of the private company's financials.

Check out more of Benzinga's Future Of Mobility coverage by following this link.

Read Next:

• US-Listed Chinese EV Startups Clock Delivery Growth In December: Li Auto Tops Charts, Mona M03 Spurs XPeng, Nio’s Onvo Breaches 10,000 Monthly Delivery Milestone

Photo courtesy: Shutterstock