BackgroundIncludes press-layer reports
- Event date (reported)
- Published
- Last updated
Background This event is more than 90 days older than this page. It is kept here as dated context, not as current news.
What changed
An April 22, 2025 report by APH Networks, based on PCMag’s reporting, said Starlink had raised its one-time congestion charge for new subscribers from $100 to $250 in the Sacramento, San Diego and Phoenix areas. The report said SpaceX gave no public explanation for the increase. It quoted a would-be buyer: “Sacramento area is pricey, ouch! Back to the waitlist for me.”
What it means for you
This is the first increase in the charge that we have a dated press source for. It marks the point where the fee stopped being a single flat amount and started varying by area. That matters because many guides written in 2024 still describe a $100 fee.
It also shows the pattern later reports confirmed: the charge moves with local demand, and areas that were sold out in late 2024 (Sacramento and San Diego among them) were among the first to see higher amounts.
Who was affected
- New subscribers in the three named metros.
- The report did not describe changes for existing customers.
A conflict between sources
A June 23, 2025 Broadband Breakfast report listed the Sacramento charge at $100, not $250. We have not resolved this. Possible explanations include different addresses within the metro, a later reduction, or a reporting error, but none of these is confirmed. Both figures stay in our press layer with their dates, and neither is treated as a quote for any address. This is the kind of disagreement our page on press versus crowd data explains.
What you can check now
- The amount for your address appears at checkout on starlink.com before you pay.
- The county map shows press amounts like this one as a separate, dated layer.
- The full sequence of reported amounts is on the surcharge timeline.
What stays the same
The charge is one-time, not monthly, and it is tied to the service address. That is consistent across the 2024 reports, this report and Starlink’s current help article.
How this fits the record
Sacramento and San Diego were both on the November 2024 sold-out list (our item), and Phoenix was added to the sold-out regions in February 2025. By April 2025 all three were reported with a higher one-time charge for new orders. Two months later, June 2025 reports put the top amount at $750 in Northwest metros.
What we don’t know yet
- Whether $250 applied across each metro or only to some addresses.
- When the change took effect. The press date is April 22, 2025.
- Whether other metros saw the same increase at the same time.
Our data
None for this period. This is a press-layer entry.
Source
News item on the Starlink congestion charge increase in several US cities
Retrieved Oct 6, 2026
Correction log
No corrections since publication.
Found an error? See corrections or contact. Fixes are made in place, dated and listed here.