SpaceX’s Starlink Revenue Per User Fell 18% As Customers Quadrupled
The Takeaway
- SpaceX says Starlink’s ARPU fell 18% to $81 between 2023 and 2025
- SpaceX expects that figure to keep falling
- Starlink’s individual subscriber business is bigger and growing faster than enterprise
SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet service quadrupled its individual subscribers between 2023 and 2025—but the average revenue each subscriber brought in fell 18% to $81 a month in that period, a draft version of SpaceX’s initial public offering prospectus shows.
The decline in Starlink’s ARPU reflects the service’s introduction of cheaper plans and expansion outside North America, where average prices tend to be lower. SpaceX says in the prospectus that it expects that figure to keep falling in the next few years, as it continues its efforts to expand Starlink globally.
The newly revealed figures from SpaceX’s IPO paperwork show the economic impact of SpaceX’s efforts to transform Starlink from a niche offering for ultraremote users into a competitor to traditional internet service providers in the U.S., as well as a bigger presence in countries where users have less money to spend. That shift underpins SpaceX’s ambition to maintain growth for its main revenue stream, as it continues development work on its Starship rocket.
However, that shift also means Starlink is a significantly different business than some investors and analysts thought. In a 2024 report, Morgan Stanley put Starlink’s revenue per user at more than $170 per month. Starlink’s average revenue per user was $99 a month in 2023 and $91 in 2024.
Despite the declining ARPU, an increase in overall subscribers meant Starlink’s revenue nearly tripled to $11.4 billion in 2025 from $3.9 billion in 2023. Starlink accounted for about 60% of SpaceX’s overall $18.7 billion in revenue last year.
A spokesperson for SpaceX did not respond to a request for comment on the figures.
The economics of Starlink’s business are sure to be in the spotlight over the next few weeks, as SpaceX prepares to go public at a valuation expected to be well above $1 trillion.
When SpaceX first launched Starlink, it started by winning over consumers in well-heeled countries who were willing to shell out more than $100 per month for satellite broadband in locations like remote cabins, RVs and boats. But as SpaceX has cut prices and expanded the service to more countries over the past couple of years, the amount of money the company brings in from each Starlink user has fallen significantly.
SpaceX now offers plans for as little as $50 per month in the U.S., down from $120 in 2023. Plans are cheaper in other places like parts of Europe and Africa.
Amazon’s planned launch of its Leo satellite internet service later this year will put more pricing pressure on Starlink. In the meantime, SpaceX has taken other steps to reach more customers beyond price cuts, including giving away free internet access terminals in some regions. It usually sells terminals for hundreds of dollars each.
SpaceX even ran a Super Bowl ad for Starlink this year, the first for any company led by Elon Musk, who has said he hates advertising. SpaceX’s draft prospectus credits marketing efforts with growing the service, touting “increasing Starlink brand awareness” as a top “driver of our performance.”
In the investor document, SpaceX divides the customer base for Starlink broadband into two segments. One is individual subscribers, including both household consumers and business customers that don’t have bespoke deals managed by the Starlink sales team. The other segment is enterprise customers, including large entities such as governments, airlines and shipping companies that have customized deals with SpaceX.
The individual subscriber segment is the bigger and faster-growing business. At the end of 2025, Starlink had 8.9 million individual subscribers, up from 4.4 million in 2024 and 2.3 million in 2023. The 4.5 million subscribers added in 2025 increased Starlink revenue by about $2.4 billion, while enterprise grew $1.4 billion over the same period of time.
In 2025, more than 60% of Starlink’s revenue came from individual subscribers, according to SpaceX. The company said in the document that it expects individual subscribers to “remain the primary driver” of Starlink growth.
The document does not include financial details for Starlink Mobile, a separate business that uses a different group of SpaceX satellites to serve as backup to traditional cell towers, beyond saying that it expects mobile “will become a significant new contributor” to revenue in the future.
SpaceX’s initial deal with T-Mobile, its exclusive partner in the U.S., is worth approximately $100 million over multiple years tied to service milestones, making it a tiny slice of Starlink revenue.
SpaceX needs to figure out how to make money from Starlink Mobile because it’s spending nearly $20 billion in cash and stock to acquire spectrum rights to operate Starlink Mobile from EchoStar in a deal due to close in 2027.