Along with a price slash, T-Mobile is petitioning customers of rival carriers in the T-Satellite beta with free service and trials.
T-Mobile’s Starlink Satellite Service Launches July 23
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T-Mobile Marketing President Mike Katz announced the T-Satellite launch date and features for customers of all carriers. | Image by T-Mobile
T-Mobile and Starlink are on the verge of officially launching their service, T-Satellite, that will allow customers to connect their phones to Starlink’s low-Earth orbiting satellites as if they were cellular towers in the sky. The service, also known as Starlink Direct-to-Cell, will officially launch on Wednesday, July 23, after being in an open beta for several months.
Starlink and T-Mobile claim the service will eliminate dead spots globally. During the beta period, customers were limited to text messaging on a select list of phones. According to T-Mobile Marketing President Mike Katz, now users can send images and even short audio clips.
T-Mobile promises to open up data capabilities, beginning with a few select apps on October 1. These apps are communication and navigation-based, and include:
- Google Maps
- Apple Maps
- AllTrails
- Accuweather
- X
- Starlink
Where will T-Satellite go from here?
It also encourages app developers to contact them to begin the process of making their programs compatible with T-Satellite, which means not all apps and data usage will be available on launch.
T-Mobile will include the service for customers on the Go5G Next and Experience Beyond plans. However, customers on other plans can add it for an extra $10 to their bill, including customers on other carriers, such as Verizon and AT&T. They just need to have a compatible phone with a free eSIM space.
T-Mobile has stated it will continue adding more phones to the compatibility list, even older models, since both companies have stated that it should work with most modern phones.
