Some SpaceX Starlink subscribers are complaining of latency spikes and rampant packet loss on the service since earlier this week (via Reddit). The kind of lag this causes is most noticeable in online games, especially multiplayer titles.
“I have been gaming on starlink for a while now and have for the most part not had many issues. However the past few days I have been getting constant ping spikes of 200ms+ every 5-15 minutes, sometimes shorter than that,” said Reddit user Zurqex.
The surges in latency aren’t constant, but they’re frequent enough to make online games essentially unplayable for users.
“Getting this as well when playing League of Legends. Before it was common to fluctuate between 30-60ms with a rare 200-300ms spike occasionally due to satellite switching I had assumed. Recently though, especially last night, I got waves of lag spikes and packet loss it feels. Started rubber banding at some moments,” said another user in response to Zurqex’s post.
These issues appear to be affecting Starlink subscribers across the globe, with several threads on the subject being posted on /r/Starlink. On Zurqex’s thread alone, Starlink subscribers from across the U.S., Canada, Germany, Australia, Romania, and more reported the same latency spikes, likely eliminating weather interference as a potential cause.
One Starlink subscriber speculated that this may be a firmware issue triggered after a recent update.
“It’s the first time in the 18+ months I’ve been using Starlink that I’ve had a poor experience. I checked and it seemed to coincide with a firmware update almost to the minute, so I’m thinking that it’s likely a firmware issue,” said belgarrand.
While some residential customers are facing connectivity issues on Starlink, marine communications provider Tototheo Maritime added Starlink to its offerings earlier this week following a 50% price cut for Starlink Maritime.
There’s no official word from SpaceX on the cause of these latency issues yet. Are you experiencing latency spikes on Starlink? Let us know in the comments below.
