A survey in the popular Starlink subreddit has shown that the majority of subscribers are either mostly or even extremely satisfied with the quality of the service they receive.
The survey, launched by self-proclaimed beta tester u/zovered, has garnered almost 1,500 votes thus far and resulted in the following distribution of choices:
- Extremely Satisfied: 690 votes
- Mostly Satisfied: 503 votes
- Neither Satisfied or Dissatisfied: 157 votes
- Mostly Unsatisfied: 84 votes
- Extremely Unsatisfied: 73 votes
Consequently, a total of 1,193 users (690 + 503), equal to 79.16 percent of all votes (= 1,193 / 1507), have said that they are happy with Starlink. An almost 80 percent approval rate is a great vote of confidence, no matter how you look at it.
If you were to calculate Starlink’s Net Promoter Score (NPS), then it would come out to 69.07 (percentage of satisfied users – percentage of dissatisfied users). An NPS score of more than 50 is generally considered great. And just for reference, Starlink competitor HughesNet’s NPS score is equal to -72, at least according to data from Comparably.
The Reddit survey was started in direct response to various issues that customers reported on both Reddit and in Facebook groups. Speed, at least in North America, seems to have dropped significantly to the point that Starlink is set to introduce a data cap of 1TB in February 2023.
Additionally, users also had to go through outages, such as this one, in the past. One of the biggest problems that subscribers seem to be experiencing is the lack of customer support that they receive. Many allegedly have to wait days until issues even get addressed.
The lack of service even prompted one Reddit user to file a complaint with the FTC’s fraud division, urging other subscribers to contact their state’s respective attorney general.
The speed and customer service issues that Starlink currently faces are likely a result of the exponential subscriber growth SpaceX experienced. In December 2022, Starlink reached its one-millionth subscriber after growing sevenfold in 2022 alone.
Meanwhile, neither SpaceX nor Starlink representatives have officially reacted to the complaints made and filed by its users. Right now, SpaceX focused on expanding its satellite constellation, which should hopefully alleviate some of the issues faced by Starlink’s customers.