Starlink users in Zimbabwe and Kenya experienced a widespread internet outage on Monday, leaving many without connectivity for approximately 30 minutes. The disruption, which occurred around 1:00 PM local time, affected a significant number of users in both countries, raising concerns about the reliability of the satellite-based service.
While some speculated that heavy rainfall in Zimbabwe could be a factor, the scale of the outage suggested a broader technical issue.
As of now, Starlink has not released an official statement regarding the cause of the disruption. However, service has since been restored, and users are reporting that their terminals are back online.
The outage comes at a time when Starlink has been rapidly expanding in Africa, providing much-needed competition in markets like Zimbabwe, where internet costs have traditionally been high.
The company’s Residential Lite package, offering speeds of up to 100 Mbps with a 1TB data cap for $30 per month, has been a game-changer, prompting local providers such as Liquid Home to introduce competitive broadband plans.
Starlink’s network relies on a combination of satellites and ground stations to deliver low-latency internet. Initially, Zimbabwean users had their traffic routed through ground stations in Spain, leading to higher latencies due to the long distance.
Recently, however, Starlink has been shifting African traffic to a new ground station in Kenya, significantly reducing latency and improving connectivity speeds.
Reports from Starlink users in Zimbabwe indicate that just before the outage, data traffic had started routing through Kenya instead of Spain. While this transition initially resulted in faster response times, users noticed a decline in overall internet speeds compared to previous levels.
The ongoing migration to the Kenyan ground station—still in its early stages—may have played a role in Monday’s disruption, as Starlink fine-tunes its infrastructure and manages the shift in network traffic.
Although the exact cause of the outage remains unconfirmed, the migration process is a likely culprit. Starlink has yet to provide details, but users can expect ongoing improvements as the company works to stabilize the transition.
For now, service appears to be fully operational again, but Monday’s incident underscores the challenges of integrating new network infrastructure. As Starlink continues its expansion across Africa, users will be watching closely to see how the company handles future disruptions.