T-Mo to commercially launch its T-Satellite tv for pc NTN service on July 23 and provide $10 per thirty days plans—together with for AT&T and Verizon clients
One of many large questions for shopper use of satellite-to-cellular, Non-Terrestrial Community (NTN) know-how has been: Is there really a marketplace for this?
T-Cellular US seems to have a solution, to the tune of greater than 1.8 million “yeses”. That’s what number of clients joined its T-Satellite tv for pc NTN beta service, which was launched in February of this 12 months. For perspective: T-Cellular US had complete buyer connections of 130.9 million on the finish of the primary quarter of this 12 months, in order that 1.8 million represents lower than 1.4% of its base of connections.
That 1.8 milion determine additionally contains “a whole bunch of hundreds” of shoppers of AT&T and Verizon, in line with Mike Katz, president of selling, technique and and merchandise at T-Cellular US. He spoke yesterday at an occasion on the T-Cellular 5G Hub, wherein the corporate introduced that it’s going to formally launch its T-Satellite tv for pc with Starlink service on July 23. (T-Cellular US’ official press launch was a bit extra restrained, saying that the beta service had included “tens of hundreds” of AT&T and Verizon clients.)
“The response has been unimaginable,” stated Katz. He supplied some extra particulars that T-Mo has realized throughout its beta testing interval for T-Satellite tv for pc: Prospects need to have the ability to use units that they have already got; to be related robotically to a satellite tv for pc once they depart terrestrial protection, somewhat than fussing with discovering line-of-sight with a satellite tv for pc; and to have ubiquitous protection, together with within the a whole bunch of hundreds of sq. miles of U.S. territory the place no terrestrial mobile community protection is out there.
“We are actually gentle years forward of what some other competitor is doing on this house,” Katz stated. He hammered that time residence throughout his presentation with a slide that boasted of energetic satellite-to-cellular help on 657 Starlink satellites (with extra being launched usually), in comparison with solely a handful accessible to Verizon, none to AT&T and fewer than 30 for OEM-driven choices from the likes of Apple and Google.
In the course of the beta interval, T-Satellite tv for pc customers have despatched and acquired hundreds of thousands of messages from everywhere in the nation in cellular lifeless zones, and the service has been used through greater than 60 completely different units, in line with Katz. It has even been used dozens of instances to attach with 911. He stated that 75% of T-Cellular US’ buyer base has units that may entry T-Sat, and added that the majority units made within the final 4 years can make the most of the service.
The beta testing interval allowed T-Cellular US to higher perceive what the expertise of its customers could be and what capability could be wanted. “We wished to be sure that we constructed a system that might scale to the hundreds of thousands of people who wished to make use of it,” Katz stated.
By way of utilization patterns, “Prospects obtain thrice extra messages than they really ship out,” he stated—which is why the service’s “computerized connection” strategy issues. Customers don’t have to tug out their units and observe on-screen prompts to proactively hook up with the NTN service, a course of which Katz known as a “online game.”
“In case you’re not capable of obtain messages since you haven’t completed the online game and pointed your telephone on the sky, you then’re not reachable. You’re not likely related. So computerized connection is one thing that desperately issues to clients,” he stated.
The main target of the beta service was on text-based messages, together with RCS and iMessages. However Katz stated that when T-Satellite tv for pc formally launches on July 23, the service may even help multimedia messaging, together with MMS, image messaging and the power to ship brief audio clips for Android, with iOS help to come back later.
As of October 1, Katz stated, the power to textual content 911 utilizing T-Satellite tv for pc will probably be accessible to all clients on any community—so long as they’ve a suitable system.
That very same day, T-Cellular US and Starlink may even add knowledge providers to T-Satellite tv for pc, and the power to make use of optimized or “satellite-enabled” apps. Katz stated T-Mo has already partnered with mapping, music and messaging suppliers to be sure that important apps can be found in satellite-only zones, he stated, calling out Apple, Google, WhatsApp, X and AccuWeather by title. Software program growth kits are additionally accessible for app builders who wish to lighten their apps in order that they are often accessed in satellite-only protection.
The T-Satellite tv for pc service will probably be included in T-Mo’s Expertise Past plan, and $10 for its different clients.
Much more audaciously, T-Cellular US is preempting Verizon and AT&T’s personal NTN service plans by providing T-Satellite tv for pc to clients of different carriers for $10 a month, with the service accessible to function in parallel to their present mobile service—successfully monetizing the opposite MNOs’ clients, with out even having to persuade them to change carriers.
Research provides a glimpse of T-Mo/Starlink’s satellite-to-cellular utilization
On a associated notice, a latest research carried out by the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid, Spain (UPM) and WePlan Analytics used crowdsourced knowledge to have a look at utilization of the T-Cellular US/Starlink direct-to-device service, based mostly on cellular community measurements passively collected from Android telephones between October 2024 and April 2025 in the course of the beta interval and earlier as a part of particular catastrophe response permissions.
That research discovered that the direct-to-cell service was “most actively utilized in accessible however underserved areas, particularly close to nationwide parks” and in giant counties with low inhabitants density. Nevertheless, the researchers additionally recorded some measurements of D2D use in locations that had been “formally coated by terrestrial networks, which factors to poor or unreliable efficiency [of] terrestrial networks”—the place D2D use would fill in protection gaps.
The research additionally concluded that D2D offered decrease sign energy than terrestrial networks however greater sign high quality that mirrored each the “long-distance, low-interference nature of satellite tv for pc hyperlinks and the unloaded state of the community.” The common throughput per beam of the D2D service was estimated at round 4 Mbps.
“Our research demonstrates that DS2D is just not merely a theoretical idea—it’s already being deployed and utilized in the actual world,” the researchers stated in a submit on LinkedIn.
