A New Cranky Talk is Live – Wifi on Airplanes! How Did We Get Here? Is It Getting Better?

Feb 6, 2023

Listen on Apple, Spotify, direct, or wherever you get your podcasts.

We thought the timing was right to do an episode on inflight wifi seeing as how Delta just made wifi free for all SkyMiles members at the beginning of this month. After touching on a little history — my favorite thing to do, especially since it drives Dave nuts — we talk about the current state of affairs and a look at what the future may bring. (Hello, Elon Musk.)

It has to keep getting better… right? (I mean, unless you’re flying Southwest.)

Email Dave here to tell him to live tweet his next flight and tell us all how the wifi is.

Brett

4 responses to “A New Cranky Talk is Live – Wifi on Airplanes! How Did We Get Here? Is It Getting Better?”

Kilroy

Feb 6, 2023 at 5:06 am

From a commercial side, are/were some airlines already including free/premium WiFi for the corporate customers that they negotiate contracts with, similar to how some hotels will include internet or breakfast in corporate contracts?

Not sure whether it would make sense to dangle that as a “free” value-add or whether it would be better to just take the additional revenue from the road warriors paying & expensing the charges.

Also worth noting is how free WiFi has become the standard at US airports, even outside of airline lounges. Airport WiFi connections are things that many of us take for granted these days, and while they probably wouldn’t be good enough for hard-core gamers, the airport WiFi networks are often reasonably fast when checked using SpeedTest.

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1. CF
  
  Feb 6, 2023 at 7:03 pm
  
  Kilroy – I don’t know if that’s happening or not, honestly.
  
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DesertGhost

Feb 6, 2023 at 9:11 am

Bouncing wi-fi signals off all the space junk might work. LOL.

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Tim Dunn

Feb 6, 2023 at 10:31 am

The real question will be how much a larger carrier such as Delta changes consumer and business perception of Wifi on aircraft and if Delta can really turn it into a marketing advantage. JetBlue is obviously small enough that they don’t shape the industry. AA is obviously capable of matching DL and the two combined could be the real tipping point. And, of course, longhaul international is still the holy grail, is likely where airlines make money but there are also lots of dead spaces around the globe where Wifi doesn’t work well enough to support high demand.

Patent Crankysat.

You could also use Chinese balloons

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