I am always familiar with the airlines, the cheapest airfare at the time, and the diamonds that are easy to fit into my itinerary: ……. This time, I flew Hawaiian Airlines from Tokyo to Honolulu, a standard overseas travel route, and back. I was shocked by a certain service, so I would like to tell you about it in detail.
The impact of free, unlimited Starlink in-flight
Hawaiian Airlines operates two daily flights from Haneda on its Tokyo – Honolulu route (one flight to/from Kansai is also in service). We used flight HA864, which departs Haneda after 8:00 p.m. on the outbound leg, and flight HA831, which departs Honolulu after 3:30 p.m. (local time) on the return leg. We also considered flight HA863, which departs at 12:00 p.m. local time, but chose flight HA831 because it allowed us to stay in Hawaii until the last minute.
The aircraft is a 278-seat Airbus A330-200 (18 business class seats and 260 economy class seats). The Economy Class seats are arranged in a 2-4-2 configuration (2-3-2 in the rear), which allows easy access to the aisle even for window seats, and some “Extra Comfort” seats offer more legroom and individual power outlets for even greater comfort.
However, after using Hawaiian Airlines this time, I am convinced that what makes Hawaiian Airlines comfortable is the “Starlink” satellite communication system installed in the in-flight Wi-Fi.
On the other hand, the in-flight entertainment on personal monitors is fun and unique, such as watching the latest movies before they are released in Japan, and content that takes advantage of the characteristics of the regions where each airline company flies to. However, in-flight announcements are interrupted and the monitor is basically fixed, making it difficult to move it to a position that is comfortable for viewing.
This is why it has become commonplace for passengers to bring their own smart devices, such as smartphones and tablets, with them when they fly, and this is where Starlink comes in handy.
Starlink, which achieves high speed and low latency by using low earth orbit satellites, can play video streaming services such as YouTube, which conventional in-flight Wi-Fi cannot handle. In fact, I spent the entire flight watching YouTube (even though I should have slept on the outbound flight since I arrived in the morning).
There were no instances of choppy or choppy video due to lack of bandwidth, and the usability was comparable to that of a 5G line or free Wi-Fi connection on the ground. Of course, browsing websites and exchanging images in chat rooms was smooth. Although we did not try it this time, online gaming was also not restricted.
There are several airlines that are installing Starlink for in-flight Wi-Fi, including Air France, Qatar Airways, and United Airlines (some of them), Alaska Airlines, which is in the same group as Hawaiian Airlines, ZIPAIR, Korean Air, and Emirates, which have announced their intention to install Starlink. Airlines have also announced their intention to introduce the system.
It is expected to become a more major service in the next few years, but Hawaiian Airlines’ strengths are that it is already in place and that it is free for frequent flyer/non-mileage members and all classes of travel. The fact that there is no need to install an app, register an e-mail address, etc. is really easy, and I was so shocked that my previous experience of web browser/text-based service only, for which I had to pay $20-30 per flight, seemed like a distant memory.
© Source travel watch