Updated February 1 with more new service details and how it will work.
Apple has just released IOS 18.3, its latest iPhone update (full details here) and the software contained an additional surprise: Compliance with the Starlink satellite network, according to a new report. And more details show how the system will work and exactly how it is different from existing services – with a very delightful change which means you are no longer showing your phone.
Some Apple’s iPhones now have access to Starlink satellite network.
“Apple Inc. has secretly worked with Spacex and T-Mobile US Inc. to add support for Starlink network to its latest iPhone software, providing an alternative to company satellite communication service,” According to Mark Gurman i Bloomberg.
Gurman describes the software update that supports technology as a “under -radar action” and the link between companies as “a surprise”.
While T-Mobile already had a Starlink satellite option for users to send urgent messages when outside the mobile interval was only for Samsung phones. And Apple’s Emergency SOS Satellite Service used rival globalstar network.
A post on X by Mario Nawfal, the founder of IBC Group, described the update as a “game switch”, saying “Apple quietly adds Starlink to the iOS 18.3”. Since Apple already has its GlobalStar service, why is this a player?
Well, as Nawfal puts it, “The main difference? No more showing your phone in the sky – Starlink works right out of your pocket.” Nawfal’s comment was reprinted by Elon Musk, who said “Podcast’s medium resolution images -The music and audio must work with the current Starlink generation on the phone.
A small number of iPhone on the T-Mobile network have enabled to work as a beta test, receiving messages saying, “You’re at T-Mobile Starlink Beta. Now you can stay connected to the text through satellite from almost everywhere. To begin the coverage experience beyond, please update in iOS 18.3. “
T-Mobile said the test will start “with selected smartphones”, but that the full start will support the vast majority of modern smartphones, and that he had opened beta for some Android phone users who run the most recent software , Android 15.
The passage from Apple to support other satellite networks beyond the globalistar has often been suggested, with Elon Musk saying he would have conversations with Apple about the involvement of Starlink in 2022.
The system will work so that when a T-Mobile phone that is part of the Starlink program is out of mobile connection, it “will try to join SPACEX satellites. Users will also be able to activate the text through the satellite menu for GlobalStar service or contact emergency services through Apple, “according to the report.
“Users in the program have a new switch on their iPhone mobile data settings to manage satellite function,” says Gurman.
The first version is only for the text, but Spacex and T-Mobile say they plan to expand into data links and sound calls in a timely manner. The service will automatically operate, with an iPhone in T-Mobile connecting to Spacex satellites when out of mobile connection. For now, the number of iPhones in beta is “minimal, with T-Mobile planning to expand the program in February,” Gurman adds.
For now, you have to be in the US to be able to have this connection, and you will apply for apparatus from the iPhone 14 onwards.
