What does the early data on D2D usage tell us?

There have been no shortage of big numbers and big news stories on satellite direct-to-device (D2D) services this year. The most recent is confirmation of SpaceX’s long-awaited IPO, likely to be the largest in Wall Street history. The company’s SEC filing has been pored over by telecom and financial analysts, with plenty of lively debate about the company’s addressable market (just search for the posts on X and LinkedIn – we’ll be publishing a separate Spotlight on the IPO soon). But between the trillion-dollar valuations, the company also noted the growth it had achieved in D2D, stating that it is providing mobile services to 7.4 million monthly unique devices across approximately 30 countries, using 650 direct-to-device satellites.

The excitement and interest generated by D2D continues to intensify. Amazon has joined the D2D race with its $ 11.6 billion acquisition of Globalstar. In the US, the three large mobile operators unveiled plans for a new joint venture to extend D2D in mobile dead zones. More generally, the GSMA Intelligence NTN tracker shows that 23 mobile operators, accounting for 695 million connections, were offering D2D connectivity at the end of Q1 2026.

The technological opportunity that D2D enables is undoubtedly significant. While 96% of the world’s population live in an area with a mobile network, plenty of us will have travelled outside populated areas and found ourselves without any mobile signal. GSMA Intelligence Network Coverage Maps show that 62% of Earth’s landmass is not covered by a terrestrial network. D2D could eventually provide a signal to almost all these locations (as well as most of the 71% of the planet covered by water)

But in the midst of all these numbers, a recent data point from T-Mobile US CEO Srini Gopalan has also grabbed some attention, namely that T-Satellite usage (the company’s D2D brand) represented 0.0002% of the operator’s total network usage in the US in May 2026. Put another way, it means T-Mobile’s terrestrial wireless traffic is 500,000 times greater than D2D traffic. Based on the latest data on US mobile network traffic, this would suggest that average monthly data usage on T-Mobile’s D2D service is less than 10 MB per month - enough to load up to 10 web pages or stream about 1 minute of video on a smartphone.

Of course, several caveats arise with such analysis:

• The use of mobile data over a select number of apps has only been available on the T-Satellite service since October 2025.
• The coming years will see the deployment of significantly more D2D capacity, with next generation satellites deployed by Starlink, Amazon and AST Space Mobile (amongst others), as well as more partnerships between satellite and mobile operators. This means the share of satellite usage will inevitably increase. 

However, no matter how many satellites are launched or how much spectrum they are assigned, the laws of physics will ultimately constrain the amount of usage that D2D can support. Two important implications arise from this. 

The first is D2D monetisation. In addition to Gopalan’s comment about satellite network usage, he also said, “Pretty much no one buys satellite standalone; they buy it as part of the premium package, which gives you a bunch of other benefits”.  There are two ways to look at this. On the one hand, it suggests consumers do not yet place significant value on D2D alone, at least in the US. On the other hand, given the technology has thus far mostly been limited to SMS, it could be seen as encouraging for operators that consumers are willing to pay a premium for a service that includes ‘basic’ D2D (amongst other perks). As the D2D service improves to provide better internet and voice services, there is potentially significant value from having it in a connectivity portfolio. 

What of the consumer willingness to pay more broadly? Survey responses suggest that 60% of consumers are willing to pay for D2D (an average across 12 countries, including the US) and it could help to reduce operator churn, though the opportunity will inevitably vary by market and service. Ultimately, mobile operators will need to strike a delicate balance between catering for demand and generating value without overpromising what D2D can deliver. 

The second implication is around spectrum. While D2D usage will increase, the actual traffic and performance it will deliver will not come close to matching terrestrial 5G (and eventually 6G) mobile and FWA services. This means assigning significantly large amounts of spectrum for D2D would be an inefficient use of spectral resources. Instead, the ability to use harmonised spectrum across multiple countries is becoming more important. This is why satellite operators are increasingly looking to MSS bands to complement the use of IMT bands, demonstrated by SpaceX’s acquisition of spectrum from EchoStar and Amazon’s purchase of Globalstar. MSS bands will probably take 2-3 years to have device support in new smartphones, but they do not require satellite operators to manage the cross-border interference or local coordination that comes with using IMT bands. Right now, satellite operators appear willing to pay a premium for that.