Elon Musk Apologizes as Rare Global Outage Disrupts Starlink Satellite Internet
SpaceX’s satellite internet network Starlink suffered a widespread outage, cutting service for tens of thousands of users across continents—including the U.S., Europe, Asia, and Australia.
Downdetector logged around 60,000 to 65,000 outage reports, with many reporting a “total blackout” or receiving “no healthy upstream” errors. This marked a rare full-system disruption for a service known for its reliability.
Michael Nicolls, Starlink’s VP of Engineering, attributed the failure to a breakdown in internal software services that manage the network core, causing the approximately 2.5-hour outage before service was mostly restored by early evening ET.
Despite the brevity, the impact was felt across regions and sectors, including military and government operations that rely on Starlink connectivity.
Elon Musk took to X to issue an apology:
“Service will be restored shortly. Sorry for the outage. “SpaceX is working to identify and fix the root cause to prevent any future occurrences.”
The disruption coincided with the recent rollout of Starlink’s Direct‑to‑Cell messaging service, introduced just a day earlier in partnership with T‑Mobile, AT&T, and Verizon. While no link has been confirmed, experts speculated the outage may have stemmed from a configuration error during routine software updates or even a cyberattack.
Starlink, which serves more than six million subscribers across 140+ countries and operates over 8,000 satellites, has become critical infrastructure in remote regions—especially for countries like Ukraine, which rely on the network for communication in conflict zones. A sudden loss of connection caused concern for these vulnerable users.
Though the outage was resolved within hours, it stands as the longest documented disruption for Starlink since it scaled into a major broadband provider—raising questions about the resilience of satellite‑based internet systems as they become central to global connectivity and national security.
Key Takeaways:
What happened: A global Starlink network outage on July 24 affected tens of thousands of users for about 2.5 hours.
Why: Caused by failures in critical internal software services; a potential misconfigured update is under investigation.
Response: Elon Musk apologized publicly and SpaceX pledged to identify and fix the root cause.
Wider implications: The incident underscores the growing dependency on satellite networks—and the risk of wide-reaching disruptions.