Ookla: Starlink Performance Surged in First Half of 2026
Starlink is narrowing a long-standing performance gap with terrestrial broadband.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 15, 2026 – A new report released Tuesday shows that satellite-delivered internet service Starlink continues to build momentum.
Starlink's broadband performance improved sharply during the first half of 2026, with twice as many U.S. users reaching the Federal Communications Commission’s 100/20 Mbps benchmark compared with a year earlier, according to Ookla.
In its U.S. Broadband Performance Report for the first half of 2026, Ookla found that Starlink performance improved across the country in the first half of 2026, with 17 states seeing at least half of Starlink users achieve the FCC’s 100/20 Mbps broadband benchmark, according to Ookla. The FCC currently uses 100/20 Mbps as its fixed broadband benchmark.
Starlink also made gains across individual states. In the first half of 2025, no state had at least half of its Starlink users reaching the 100/20 Mbps threshold. That number rose to five states by the second half of 2025 and 17 states during the first half of 2026.
South Dakota led Starlink’s state-level performance, with 58.2 percent of users reaching the benchmark, up from 37.1 percent a year earlier. Nebraska followed at 57 percent, while Colorado, Wyoming and Minnesota also topped 55 percent. California reached 42.8 percent, while Texas and Florida posted rates of 31.4 percent and 30.9 percent, respectively.
Ookla said some of the states with large Starlink subscriber bases, including California, Texas, Florida, Arizona and Washington, also have larger Speedtest sample volumes. That suggests the service faces greater capacity demands and potential congestion in those markets.
Illinois provided another example of the improvement. The percentage of Starlink users reaching 100/20 Mbps increased from 43.2 percent in the second half of 2025 to 53.2 percent in the first half of 2026.
The gains come as SpaceX expands the Starlink constellation and ground infrastructure. Ookla's data indicates that newer satellite capacity and network upgrades are helping Starlink improve performance, including its ability to deliver higher upload speeds.
Starlink nevertheless continues to trail terrestrial broadband. Ookla found that 46 states and Washington, D.C., had at least 60 percent of fixed broadband Speedtest users reaching 100/20 Mbps during the first half of 2026. Thirteen states exceeded 70 percent.
The results point to a growing role for satellite broadband in areas where fiber and other terrestrial networks remain difficult or expensive to deploy. But the gap with fixed broadband also shows that Starlink's improvements have not eliminated the performance advantage of wired networks.
For Starlink, the challenge increasingly will be maintaining performance as its U.S. subscriber base grows while adding enough satellite and ground capacity to limit congestion.
