ViaSat-3 vs Starlink: will Viasat's new satellites fix the lag?

ViaSat-3 adds capacity, which can bring faster speeds and roomier data rules over time, but its satellites sit in the same geostationary orbit as Viasat’s older ones, about 22,236 miles up, so lag stays in the hundreds of milliseconds. Viasat’s measured median was 750 ms and Starlink’s 39 ms in Q1 2026 (Ookla), and those figures predate ViaSat-3 F2 entering service on September 17, 2026; no newer US satellite report from Ookla had appeared by November 3, 2026.

What ViaSat-3 is and where it stands today

ViaSat-3 is Viasat’s new generation of high-capacity satellites. Ookla reported that the second one, F2, launched in November 2025, and Viasat announced on September 17, 2026 that “its ViaSat-3 (VS3) F2 satellite has entered service across the Americas.”

Viasat has been telling customers to sit tight. Its plans page says: “The new ViaSat-3 satellite should improve the experience for current customers and new customers, so no need to change to a different satellite or plan.” That’s a promise of a better experience, worded loosely, and it says nothing about lag.

More capacity, same distance: why the lag stays

Geostationary satellites orbit 35,786 km (about 22,236 miles) above the equator, which is what lets a fixed dish point at one spot in the southern sky. Every request you send goes up to the satellite and down to a ground station, and the reply makes the same trip back: at least 143,144 km in all, roughly 477 ms at the speed of light before any processing or routing. Measured results land higher, at 750 ms for Viasat in Q1 2026. Hughes, which runs geostationary satellites too, told its bankruptcy court that “the physics of that altitude impose relatively slow service with a round-trip signal latency of approximately 600 milliseconds.”

Starlink’s satellites fly roughly 340 to 570 km up, about 60 to 105 times closer, so the pure travel time for a satellite overhead is about 5 to 8 ms. Routing and ground stations bring the measured median to 39 ms.

More capacity helps when too many households share a beam in the evening. It does nothing for the delay you notice on a video call, in an online game or when a web page pauses before loading. Viasat’s own legal disclaimers spell out the effect: “The performance of some games over the internet is very poor and some games may not work at all,” and VPNs and remote access may be very slow. Those lines describe the orbit, so they apply to ViaSat-3 service too. Why old satellite internet lags walks through one click, step by step.

What could change for you: speed, data thresholds, price

Speed at busy times is the most likely improvement, but none has been measured yet. Viasat advertises baseline speeds of 80 Mbps with bursts up to 150, 180 or 200 Mbps depending on the plan, while its own data policy lists Essentials as “Up to 50 Mbps”, and its users’ measured median download was 41.05 Mbps in Q1 2026, before F2. Upload is the weaker side: Viasat users’ median upload was 0.95 Mbps in that quarter, which is what makes video calls and photo backups slow.

Data rules haven’t loosened so far. Viasat’s Unlimited Data Policy, dated October 8, 2026, three weeks after F2 entered service, still says Unleashed customers’ typical usage is “below 360 gigabytes (GB) in any 30-day period”, with lower priority at busy times above that. Unleashed Max’s line is 840 GB, and Essentials gives 150 GB of High-Speed Data before Standard Data.

Prices on November 3, 2026 were unchanged from October: $69.99 (Essentials), $99.99 (Unleashed) or $179.99 (Unleashed Max) a month after the first 12 months, plus a $15 monthly lease on every plan.

Your contract is worth a look before you accept any upgrade. Viasat’s plans page says current customers don’t need to change satellite or plan to benefit. If Viasat still offers new equipment or a new plan, ask whether it restarts your term: its customer agreement says a plan or address change that needs new equipment or a technician visit starts a new 24-month term. Does a plan change restart your contract?

How to tell whether ViaSat-3 helped at your house

National medians lag behind events, so measure your own line. Use the same device, plugged into the Viasat modem with a cable if you can, and test at two times: around 8 p.m., when the beam is busiest, and late at night.

1. Write down a baseline now: download, upload and ping at both times, on three different evenings.
2. Note your data use for the month, and whether you crossed your plan’s line (150 GB on Essentials, 360 GB “typical usage” on Unleashed).
3. Repeat the same tests a month or two later.

If the 8 p.m. download has climbed and the evenings feel smoother, the extra capacity is reaching you, and that may be all you wanted. If ping is still in the hundreds of milliseconds, which physics says it will be, and lag was your complaint, the new satellite hasn’t changed your answer.

What Viasat itself says about home internet

On its earnings call of August 4, 2026, Viasat said it ended June 2026 with 115,000 US fixed broadband subscribers and $111 in average revenue per user, and that “fixed services and other revenue was down 27% as U.S. fixed broadband subscribers continue to decline.” It said it expects the US fixed broadband base to stabilize “sometime after ViaSat-3’s Flight 2 enters service.”

Read plainly, Viasat’s own goal for F2 is to stop losing home customers. A shorter delay isn’t on the list, because the orbit doesn’t allow it.

Viasat today vs Starlink today

Leaving Viasat costs $15 for each month left on an Essentials term and nothing on Unleashed or Unleashed Max; the fee calculator works out yours. The full side-by-side, with equipment and setup, is in Starlink vs Viasat, and the steps are in switching from Viasat to Starlink.

Keep Viasat, or wait, if…

• You’re on Unleashed or Unleashed Max. With no contract, waiting a few months to see whether F2 helps your evening speeds costs nothing but time, and you can switch any month after that.
• Your household mostly streams, emails and browses, and nobody minds the pause before pages load.
• Your own 8 p.m. tests, repeated a month or two after F2 entered service, show evening speeds that now suit the household.
• Starlink’s price at your address is well above your Viasat bill.

Waiting for ViaSat-3 to cure lag isn’t on this list, because it won’t.

Compare Viasat and Starlink

Checking method: each price, fee and rule here links to the provider’s or regulator’s own page, dated the day we read it. No internet provider pays for a place on this site; the only income is the Starlink referral explained on our money page. Our fact-checking · How we make money · Corrections